


Of Initials and Postscripts

by irrationalmoony, LadyAmina



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Friendship, M/M, Other, WIP, pen pal au, wolfstar
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-08
Updated: 2018-11-01
Packaged: 2019-02-12 05:56:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 55,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12952791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irrationalmoony/pseuds/irrationalmoony, https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyAmina/pseuds/LadyAmina
Summary: To encourage inter-school comradery, a pen pal program was established. While everyone else at Hogwarts got pen pals from Beauxbatons, Durmstrang, Castelobruxo, and Uagadou, Sirius is assigned a home-schooled student...





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> 2k17 NaNoWriMo

**Dear Student,**

**Hi.**

**Sorry, that’s about all I have to say to you. Bye.**

**Sincerely,  
** **S. O. B.**

**P.S. I know it’s not your fault, and I’m not trying to take it out on you, I swear. I just don’t know what else to say. I know McGonagall (that’s our professor and head of house) gave us this whole list of talking points but it’s stupid, everything is stupid, this project is stupid. Okay, now I’m done. Bye.**

**P.P.S. It’s just that, like, everyone else in Gryffindor gets pen pals from Beauxbatons. And, again, it’s not your fault you’re not from Beauxbatons, but everyone else is going to be talking to people who are also all talking to each other and I hate being on the outside of things. I hate it. So yeah, the whole thing is dumb and stupid. Sorry you didn’t get a better partner.**

**P.P.P.S. And like, I speak French! And McGonagall KNOWS I speak French. I would totally have an in with a Beauxbatons kid, right? And she knows I hate not being included in main events like this, and yet she gives me this wink like oh-ho, I’m so special, like she chose me specifically to be isolated in this already stupid project. I’m mad at her. And I love her, so I hate being mad at her, and that makes me feel even more alone.**

**P.P.P.P.S. I’m sorry for talking about feeling alone when you’re all the way Merlin knows where, being homeschooled and you don’t even have a school house to feel excluded from. Do you have friends? Do you know other witches and wizards? Are your parents magic? Have you always been homeschooled?**

**P.P.P.P.P.S. Sorry for all the post scripts. Okay, bye.**

 

_Dear S. O. B.,_

_Sorry you got partnered up with me. You don’t have to do it, just say you’re doing it, I’ll confirm your story._

_Best wishes,  
_ _R.J. L._

_P.S. I’m sorry you feel excluded, I know what that’s like and it’s the worst feeling. Can you switch with someone who wouldn’t mind it so much? I’ve kind of been really looking forward to this project, due to the whole being excluded from everything else and not even having a House to belong to. But it’s fine, I’ll get over it. Don’t find someone just out of pity, okay? Thank you._

_P.P.S. Yes, I do have friends. I’m not some kind of a weird loner cut off from everyone. I do know other witches and wizards, but they’re not my peers. Does it matter if my parents are magic or not? I go to muggle high-school, but I’ve always been home-schooled in magic subjects. Not sure why you care. Au revoir._

 

**R.J.L.,**

**Well, I don’t want to not do it at all, that would be even worse.**

**S.O.B.**

**P.S. I can ask around and see if anyone will switch. You should get the full experience you were looking forward to, I’m sorry I’ve messed that all up. Where do you live? You’d be in Hogwarts if you weren’t homeschooled, right? McGonagall said something about you being “a little closer to home” than the Beauxbatons kids. Do you know about the houses? How much do you know about Hogwarts?**

**P.P.S. Does that mean your friends are muggles? Do you spend a lot of time with muggles? I’ve never met a muggle. I see them a lot, either in passing or like parents of muggleborn kids when they see them off or pick them up from school. I think they’re really cool. What is muggle school like? What do you learn there?**

**P.P.P.S. No it doesn’t matter to me if your parents are wizards, there’s a girl in my house who’s like one of my closest friends who’s completely muggle born and she’s the coolest.**

**P.P.P.P.S. I like your owl. We hung out for a while today.**

 

_Dear S. O. B.,_

_Let me know what you decide / if you find someone._

_Kind regards,  
_ _R.J. L._

_P.S. I live in Wales. Used to live in Scotland, but we moved when I was 6. I know about the Houses and I know a bit about Hogwarts, from what my dad has told me, he’s a wizard (mum’s not), but he doesn’t really like talking about it much. I think he thinks it would made me sad. So if you could tell me more about what it’s like, not boring descriptions I could have just as easily read in books, but what real life experience of going there is like, I’d appreciate that._

_P.P.S. My friends aren’t wizards, correct, and most of them don’t know that I am, either, so that part sucks a bit, I don’t like lying to them. School is fine, normal, we learn Maths, and Physics, and History, and Geography, and Psychology, and Sociology, and Philosophy, and English, and French, and Chemistry, and Biology, and we suffer in Gym class._

_P.P.P.S. Maybe don’t say it like that the next time someone asks you that, it sounds too defensive and reminds me of “I’m not homophobic, my neighbour is gay!”. Just a piece of advice, don’t mean anything bad by it, I believe you that it doesn’t matter to you. I just know that there’s still a lot of people to whom it does matter, and I wanted to make sure I wasn’t talking to one of them._

_P.P.P.P.S. His name is Monsieur Fabiola Paavo Baloo Brown the First. Yours doesn’t trust me._

 

**R.J.L.M.N.O.P.,**

**My best friend Pete said he wouldn’t trade, but he’d like to be your pen pal as well as keeping the one he already has. I told him to fuck himself. He didn’t like that very much. And everyone else who was willing to trade isn’t good enough for you, so, sorry, you’re stuck with me.**

**Yours,  
** **S.O.B.**

**P.S. What is it like in Wales, is it much different? Have you ever been to England? I’m in Scotland now but it hardly feels like it because Hogwarts is such a liminal space. Feels very detached from the rest of the country.**

**Here’s what Hogwarts is like:**

**When you first come into the castle you go through these great big doors, and the first hundred times you do it it’s pretty impressive. You can feel the surface tension of the magic as you pass it, but it took me a while to decide that’s what it was, it just feels very, like, mmm. Like affection, but in your whole body, like something’s pulling on you gently but not in any particular direction. And between that and just how big the entrance is, it’s really An Experience just coming into the castle from the grounds. You get used to it after a while though, but even then, sometimes it still strikes me as, like, wow. So yeah, so you enter the castle and then there’s the great hall, which is where meals happen, and honestly when I think of Hogwarts as just the entity of the castle, that’s what I think of. I know it says in textbooks that the ceiling is like the sky, but they never say how close it makes you feel to the sky, then. Like the clouds really are only as far away as the rafters. I like when it’s winter and the stars come out by dinner, I get lost looking up at them while everyone else eats. And it always sounds warm. Lots of friends talking and people getting to know each other and making small talk and just being people, and the sound sort of hugs you while you look up at the sky-ceiling and occasionally remember to put food in your mouth. At least that’s how it is for me. And there’s the grand staircase, which is like a normal, really big staircase, but then all the staircases after that are like, it’s like they have their own personalities. So some of them are really temperamental and they act up on rainy days, and some staircases are like really long, but every time you walk on them it seems like it takes no time at all to get from one end to the other. Those are kind ones. And some stairs trip you up or get you stuck, or make you slip. We’ve tried labeling them, but it never stays. Without fail, James, my other best friend, always gets stuck in the one on the second floor staircase. Every single time. He’s hopeless. And then there’s classrooms, and you can always tell what classroom you’re in based on how it feels. Even in old, unused classrooms, you can still feel what they once were. Like old charms classrooms feel like that tiny vibratey feeling you get with the end of a cheering charm, and old transfiguration classrooms smell a little like feathers for some reason, etc. I don’t know about the other common rooms, to be honest, but I’m a Gryffindor, and our common room is definitely the best. I can’t imagine anything else quite so homey and warm and cozy. It’s like if a soft blanket with a heating charm on it, but it’s an entire room. All of the furniture looks very ornate and pretty but it’s lying, it’s not so pompous as it all looks, it’s way more comfortable than pretty. Poofy chairs and sofas you sink into and a big, big fireplace that makes everything smell like burning Cherrywood and makes everything perfectly warm. You can sleep on any surface with no blanket and sleep perfectly through the night. And we have. Many times. The dormitories are just like that, too, but there’s less furniture and stuff – three beds, three dressers, three vanities, three bedside tables. All the rest is dark wood and empty space and after the bright, softness of the common room, the first time you go up, it feels kind of empty, but then you realize, it’s meant to be so that you can make that space whatever you want it to be. I have posters all over. Bands I like and pictures of my friends. James has all his Quidditch stuff, he likes the Tornados even though they suck right now. And Pete has charts and things. He’s like the smartest person in the world, but he sucks at studying, and he tries so hard, so he has this board above his bed where he hangs all his study material so that he’s always looking at it. I think it does help a bit. He definitely thinks so. And we just cover the walls with our things, and our clothes are like everywhere and our school things. So it’s actually my favourite, most magical place in the castle. Because it’s ours, it’s our stuff and our space and there’s none of our parents or anything but the things we want and use and yeah. Dunno if I’m explaining it well enough, but that’s how Hogwarts feels to me, the things they don’t put in textbooks.**

**P.P.S. I know about half of what those are. Why do you suffer in gym class? What do you learn there?**

**P.P.P.S. I’m not those people.**

**P.P.P.P.S. Mine’s name is Bird, and yeah, they’re like that. They’re kind of a bitch. I wouldn’t wait around for them to warm up to you, it’s a rarity. I am in love with Monsieur Fabiola, we’re best friends, now.**

 

_S.,_

_Wow. Thank you._

_R._

_P.S. Longer letter to follow_

 

_Dear A. W. S. O. B.,_

_Again, thank you.. I’ve reread that twelve times now, and I want to go to Hogwarts more than ever. That was beautiful. I felt like I was there reading it, and I think I’ll be able to dream about it much clearer now._

_Wales is very green and very cloudy and very wet. But I quite like it. I’ve been to London a few times, but that’s it._

_I suffer in Gym class because they make me do physical exercise and that is gross. We learn nothing but that the world is a cruel, cruel place, and that no matter how many times the professor says he grades progress, not results, you’ll still only get a C while the arseholes who can run fast will get A’s even though they only show up for a third of the classes._

_Sincerely,  
_ _R.J. L._

_P.S. Oi! You already have two best friends, leave Fa to me!_

_P.P.S. Say hi to James and Pete for me! Are you all in Gryffindor? Do you share a dorm? Do you have any friends in other Houses? You said you don’t know about the other common rooms, have you never been in one? Are you not allowed to go in? That sounds pretty rubbish, what if your best friend is in there, where are you supposed to hang out!?_

_P.P.P.S Tell me if I get annoying with my questions._

_P.P.P.P.S Bird bit me when I tried bribing them with a biscuit. Ouch._

 

**R.J.**

**Ohhh what do the A and the W stand for? And why did this letter come as a set? I'm so intrigued.**

**You're very welcome for the description and if you want more detailed descriptions of specific places, just ask. I am a font of feelings about this castle.**

**S.O.B.**

**P.S. Muggle school sounds awful to be honest, you should quit. But Wales sounds kind of nice, in a dreary mystery novella sort of way. Maybe just quit school and don't quit Wales. What do you do there other than school and magic learning? What do you do with your muggle friends for fun? What do your parents do?**

**P.P.S. Fay-Fay can make their own decisions. They have chosen me, I don't make the rules.**

**P.P.P.S. I will tell them hi from you! It's not that we're not allowed in the other common rooms, we are if we go with someone from that house, but I've declined all invitations hitherto. For reasons. They don't make much sense to other people.**

 

_Dear S. O. B.,_

_The A stood for amazing and the W stood for wonderful. The letter came in two parts because your description made me too emotional to gather my thoughts and put them in coherent sentences, but I also wanted to reply to you right away. Tell me about the grounds?_

_Thank you,  
_ _R.J. L._

_P.S. I can’t quit school, and I don’t really want to. It sucks sometimes, but I like learning things. Wales is exactly like that, and then on sunny days it’s magical. I read and I read some more, and I read, and then sometimes I read. My friends and I usually just hang out at someone’s house, or go to the movies or something. My dad works for the Ministry and my mum is a landscape architect._

_P.P.S. He hates being called that._

_P.P.P.S. Want to tell me the reasons? I’m not exactly people._

_P.P.P.P.S. I’m feeling a bit sick so my next letter might come a bit later than usual, sorry._

 

**Dear Rad J.L.,**

**I was going to guess that the W was for Wise, but wonderful works just as well. My first instinct is to apologize for making you emotional, but on second thought I think you mean the good kind. Right? If not then I am sorry.**

**The grounds are very green and almost always very damp. Fog lands on them and just kind of stays there forever. But it’s one of those things that can be annoying (like when it’s chilly out and all you want is to be toasty warm, but instead you’re cold and the bottoms of your uniform are wet and everything is just a bit shite) but also manages to grow on you. In the later months of the school year, on sunny, dry days, you kind of start to miss it. It feels less complete without the fog and the dew. There are trees around, but mostly the hills just kind of roll lazily along and make everything look a bit closer together than it really is. You can see the Quidditch pitch from some of the towers, it’s a few minutes’ walk to get to and you’ll forget every time how long of a walk it actually is. And I mean every time. I go out a lot to watch Jamie practice with the Gryffindor team, and then of course game days, and every time it’s just a bit further away than I think it is. There’s one tree on the skirt of the grounds that’s the most badarse thing, they only just planted it six years ago, our first year here. It’s a willow tree, but if you go near it, it tries to murder you with its branches. It’s awesome. There’s lots of rumors and legends about why they put it there at all. The most popular story is that there’s a student in our year who was so terribly behaved before they arrived at Hogwarts that they needed to plant a whomping willow tree to threaten them. Like house points and detentions weren’t going to be enough, this kid needed to be told ‘watch out or we’ll let the murder tree deal with you’. There’s much speculation about which kid it was. I subscribe to the theory that it’s Snivellous. He’s a kid in our year who’s just the worst. Most people think it was me. It’s not, though. Just so you know. One time we were asking Professor Flitwick about it and he was telling us the usual, that our theories are rubbish, but THEN he accidentally said “of course it’s not Mr. B-, that student never did come to Hogwarts” and that sure poured pixiedust on the fiendfyre. Sorry, I’m way off topic. So way from the Whomping Willow, there’s the Forest, which is in all the textbooks, I’m sure you’ve heard about all the horrible, terrible things that live there. They say that stuff so kids don’t go wandering in, because realistically they shouldn’t, there definitely are some dangerous things in there. But there’s also lots of really lovely things, too. Like unicorns and bowtruckle families, and trees that turn autumn colours in winter when everything else is dying. And if you go deep enough in there are spots that never get any rain because the tree canopy is too thick, and they’re these little oases in these thick, thick woods. Even the creatures that are supposed to be evil can actually be kind, if not outright hospitable. If you’re kind enough to them or know the right people, anyway. And speaking of the right people there’s a single little shack on the grounds, too, there’s a clear view of it and the surrounding garden and pumpkin patch from Gryffindor tower. That’s Hagrid’s hut. He lives there. He’s groundskeeper and key-keeper. He’s half-giant and full amazing. He’s like one of our best friends. He’s always got a kettle of tea and an inedible pasty when you’re feeling troubled and alone. He’s the absolute worst with advice, but he cares so hard even when nobody else has the time or energy to care. He’s wonderful and I bet he’s not in any of the books. So yeah, that’s the grounds. Somebody else would probably give you a more comprehensive working knowledge of the flora and fauna and geography and whatnot, but that’s not what I’m about, sorry.**

**A.W.S.O.B.**

**P.S. You sound like a nerd. Nice.**

**P.P.S. What department is your dad in and what on earth does a landscape architect do? Do those words even go together?**

**P.P.P.S. How about Monsieur Fabulous? If he doesn’t like that I’m thinking of taking it for myself and having my name legally changed.**

**P.P.P.P.S. Here goes: James and Pete and I make a point to know Hogwarts better than anyone ever before us. We’ve got this sort of map thing we’ve been working on since second year, documenting every passage and every crevice of the castle. And we’re good at it. I know we’ve seen places that nobody’s seen before, places I don’t even know if the founders told each other about when they were building it. But I have this, I dunno, this fear. That if I really do see every part of the castle, then it’ll somehow stop being so magical. I want to know everything about it this place but also, I’m afraid to actually see all of it. So whenever there are parties in the other houses or whenever a friend says to meet them somewhere like that I say no thanks. James and Pete have been in all of them. I don’t want to. Dunno.**

**P.P.P.P.P.S. That’s okay, take your time. Feel better.**

**P.P.P.P.P.P.S. Sorry this one is so long.**

 

_S. O. Beautiful Wordsmith,_

_Never apologize for long letters, I loved it. The grounds sound amazing. It’s foggy here today, maybe if I squint I can imagine I’m there instead. Dad’s in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. Landscape architect basically means designing the outdoor areas and structures, sometimes landmarks. So that they’re as pretty as can be, and good for the environment, or mean something in that place. Mum loves doing it, and she would love the idea of your map. As do I, that sounds so amazing! Is it a super secret projects that outsiders aren’t allowed to see? And your reason sounds perfectly logical to me._

_Sorry it took so long for me to write back, and that it’s short, I’m still recovering. Anything new and interesting happening?_

_Hope to hear from you sooner than you heard from me,  
_ _R. J. Lord of the Whomping Willow_

_P.S. You sound like a nerd too._

_P.S.S. Fabulous could totally work, try it :)_

 

**R.Junebug.L.,**

**You told your mum about my map? That’s a super-secret! But also, it feels kind of nice that you talk about me with your mum, so I’ll let it slide and I won’t submit your name for review to James and Peter. They say hello, by the way, and James is very envious of me for having such an interesting pen pal. His is this guy who won’t stop hitting on him even though he knows next to nothing about him because he never lets Jamie get a word in. And Pete is fighting with half the house because of drama between his pen pal and theirs. Meanwhile I’m sitting here quietly, imagining foggy scenes of Wales and talking about your mum. I think I’m winning.**

**Starshine.O.B.**

**P.S. I used to know people in that department. I’ll try not to hold that against your father.**

**P.P.S. Lord of the Whomping Willow!**

**P.P.P.S. I’m not a nerd, I’m cool. Obviously.**

 

_Sunflower O. B.,_

_I said my mum would love the idea of the map, not does love it. I wouldn’t tell a soul about a secret so secretive,, who do you take me for? But I do talk to her about you, dad too. I’m glad you’re growing to like me and aren’t mad about getting me for your penpal anymore. James should report the guy, or at least stop replying to him. My father is one of the good ones now, please don’t hold his job against him. You mentioned quidditch before, would you tell me more about that? Not the game or the rules, but what it’s like watching it and stuff. Do Houses get super competitive about it? Is it true there’s giant hourglasses full of gems which count points?_

_From rainy Wales,  
_ _R.J. L._

_P.S. How is my tree doing?_

_P.P.S. You can be a nerd and be cool._

_P.P.P.S. Was that your blood on the corner of the parchment? Did you call Fa Fabulous? Did he bit you?? I’m sorryyyyy_

 

**Rotten Juicy Lime**

**Okay, that's fair. You can tell her if you think there's no way for it to get back to Hogwarts if you do. I trust your judgement on it. I'm sorry I was an arse to you in my first letter. I was bitter and grumpy and I had no idea it would work out that I have the best pen pal in school. Even the ones from like Slytherin and Hufflepuff who are talking to people from Castelobruxo and Uagadou and interesting places aren't as content as I am to sit and write to a Welsh nerd.**

**You've never been to a quidditch match before? Even with your father? I love matches, they're so high energy and low worry. I like when lots of people get together and they all care about the same thing. It is hugely competitive, though. Here and everywhere. Minor league quidditch is absurd, let alone the majors. I've even heard of parents getting into duels over little league matches. There's one team for every house in the Hogwarts League and the competition is intense.**

**Yes, there are giant hour glasses filled with magical gems for each house, they're for keeping track of house points. It's the merit system. What house was your dad in? When was he here? Does he know Minnie?**

**Silly Old Bum**

**P.S. Your tree is as bloodthirsty as ever. A first year nearly lost her life when she was dared to touch the trunk last week.**

**P.P.S. Okay, I will be that, then.**

**P.P.P.S. No, Fabulous was okay, Monty is what got me bit. I'll survive, but I'm hoping it scars. I'm going to tell everyone it was a hippogriff, though, not an owl.**

 

_S. Ollivander B.,_

_I told mum and she loves it like I thought she would. No worries, there’s no way she’d tell anyone who could get it back to Hogwarts. And it’s okay about the first letter. I mean I was upset then, but I got over it. Especially because you kept writing me then anyway. The quidditch matches sound a bit stressful, to be honest. I’d still love to attend one, though._

_My dad was in Ravenclaw. I really like wearing his old school scarf, it’s so soft and warm, are they all like that? Yeah, he remembers her, she was a few years below him. Hard not to notice someone who transforms all the brooms into great cormorants because they wouldn’t let her join the team. Did you ever play or wanted to play? Which position would you play? If I were forced to do it, I’d be a keeper I think. Or maybe a beater, so I’d act out my anger toward the world in a healthy manner._

_Sleepily,  
_ _R.J. L._

_P.S. Don’t??? Try to touch the trunk??? I don’t want to be responsible for any deaths! I don’t know why they kept it, really, it was too dangerous to begin with, and now it doesn’t even have a purpose._

_P.P.S. I’m confused, you called Fa Monty? Where did that come from? I can’t believe he let you call him Fabulous without consequences, that never happens, he must really love you._

_P.P.P.S. I don’t know if this is weird or not, but there’s a package coming following this letter. It’s cookies, I made too many. I’d just send them with the letter, but Fa looks too tired to carry it, so I’m borrowing dad’s work owl. And Fa wouldn’t let me give the letter to anyone but him, so. Double mail, yay?_

 

**Renegade Jungle Lover,**

**What else is your mum like? She sounds really cool. James’s mum is like that, really cool and supportive and kind. I wish I could brag harder about the “map” but it’s horribly disorganized if I’m being honest. It’s more like a series of charts than an actual, cohesive map.**

**Quidditch can be stressful, but to me they’re stressful in a good way. The kind of nerves and things that dissipate when you take a minute to remind yourself that the outcome of the match doesn’t actually affect the rest of your life and that the people around you are yelling with you, not at you. You should definitely go to at least one. Even if you decide you hate it once you’ve gone, it’s an experience I can’t imagine not having one way or another.**

**Ravenclaws are the weirdest kinds of amazing. At least the ones I know are. That whole house operates on another level entirely. Was it like that when he was here? Is he like that now? Will my friends grow out of their weirdness? I hope not.**

**That’s McG! That is entirely how I have always imagined she was when she was younger, I’m so happy to know how right I was. I can’t wait to tell her about this discovery!**

**I play chaser when we get together to do little amateur games. We do those sometimes when nobody’s booked the field and everyone is bored. Houses don’t count for that and you can play whatever position you want and I always do chaser because James is chaser and we work really really well together. Should I be fearful of all that rage in you?**

**S!O!B!**

**P.S. You do know it’s not ACTUALLY your tree, right, Lord of the Whomping Willow? If it finally does take someone out the only one who can blame you personally is me.**

**P.P.S. Well it started with me trying to just call him Monsieur, and then he wasn’t answering to that so I was like “Monsieur! Monsieur! Hey, Monty!” and that’s when The Bite occurred.**

**P.P.P.S. THIS IS TOTALLY NOT WEIRD, THEY CAME WHILE I WAS WRITING THIS AND THEY ARE UGLY AND DELICIOUS, I LOVE THEM, THANK YOU SO MUCH! I’m sending back a pasty for you, though I didn’t make it myself. But it tastes like Hogwarts, so maybe you’ll forgive me for that.**

**P.P.P.P.S. How are you feeling? Any better?**

 

_Silly Onion Balthazaar,_

_Are you interested in all your friends’ mums this much? Her name is Hope and the name fits her really well. She’s full of kindness and love, not just for me and dad, but also for complete strangers. She’s pretty busy at work at the moment, but when she isn’t, she loves volunteering at all kinds of different places; I go with her sometimes._

_I don’t think your friends will grow out of the weirdness, my dad definitely hasn’t. Another level entirely like they are fascinated about everything and want to know everything about everything and consume all the possible knowledge in the world, but are simultaneously too lazy to do the work they should actually be doing? He’s been like that forever, as far as I know._

_Uhhh maybe don’t tell her I told you that? I don’t want to get in trouble with her._

_Nah, don’t fear the rage, only those who have wronged me have to be wary of it._

_Best wishes,  
_ _Really Joyful Lad_

_P.S. You do know that it really is my tree, right? Or at least, was planted there for me?_

_P.P.S. I hope you recover from The Bite soon. I’m sure Fa regrets it. If he doesn’t look like he does, bribe him with ginger biscuits._

_P.P.P.S. I tried to pick the pretty ones for you!! Hmph. You’re welcome. The pasty is, in fact, delicious, so I do forgive you for not making it yourself. Please send more._

_P.P.P.P.S. I feel much better, thank you. Just a few days of sickness, nothing I couldn’t handle._

 

**Ahr. Jay. Elle.**

**Yes, yes I am. I don’t know how much I’m comfortable saying all at once like this, but I’ll leave it at I grew up without a mother. Or father. No parents. So when other people have really good parents I like to hear about them and learn and try to understand what that’s like. Like your mum. She sounds like a fairytale. Both your parents do. That is, by the way, exactly what I meant about Ravenclaws. This one time, my friend Emmeline – she’s a Ravenclaw in my year – and her whole group of friends skipped classes for three whole weeks and trapped themselves in a dorm in their tower. They say they didn’t even leave for shower-breaks and they had accomplices sneaking up food from meals while they worked on this project. They missed classes and put their house points into the negatives and they’re still working off the detentions to this day but they maintain that it was definitely worth it, only here’s the thing! The “”””project”””” turned out to be like nothing. Tiny. It was so bizarre. AND if you ask any of them about it now, Emmeline included, they just laugh and laugh and laugh.**

**Remind me not to wrong you.**

**Ehs Oh Bee.**

**P.S. What? Please explain. Are you joking because of the rumor stuff I told you? I don’t understand. Explain explain explain explain explain. Please.**

**P.P.S. Fa and I are good now. We talked it all out.**

**P.P.P.S. I will send more! Now! I’ll be right back! But you won’t even know that because I’ll be back before I send this, so no time will have passed for you!**

**P.P.P.P.S. See? Told you. Enjoy the pasties!**

 

_Sweet O. B.,_

_I want to eat nothing but these pasties for the rest of my life, they’re so delicious, how are they so delicious?? I’m sorry to hear about your (lack of) parents, I don’t know what I’d do without mine. They love me so much, even despite of everything that’s messed up with me, and they’ve always been so supportive of everything, and have tried giving me the best that they could. Dad really wanted me to go to Hogwarts and have a “normal” school experience, but it didn’t work out in the end. But he’s a great teacher, and what he doesn’t know he asks other people to teach me, and I feel like I’m getting a good education out of it all. And when I asked to go to muggle school they made that happen too. They’re just...really the best._

_I have a big maths test coming up tomorrow so of course I’m not going to make this letter short. That would be the smart thing to do, and not to brag, I am smart, but I do oh so love to procrastinate. So I’m just gonna keep on sitting here on my window sill, looking at the forest and the sky and its pretty changing colours, listening to the birds chirping, sipping my tea and slowly writing down this letter to my favourite, and only, penpal._

_With a pen. Because I don’t live in timey wimey past like some people. How can you live with quills? Okay, I’ll admit the writing is very aesthetically pleasing, but for what cost? Dipping your quill into the ink bottle for every other word, spilling your ink, getting ink stains all over your clothes… Speaking of clothes, do you really wear robes? And hats? Are the hats a real thing? They just seem so silly, I don’t know. Sorry if I offended._

_I wish I was better at the heating charm. My tea is getting cold, and all I can manage to do it make it lukewarm. And I’m cold. Like, always. I sleep under three to four blankets. I don’t know why I’m telling you this._

_I got an A for my history paper. That’s good, that’s the best grade. I vaguely remember mentioning grades to you before and you didn’t ask about them, so maybe you know how they work? In case you don’t, it goes from A to F, skipping the E for some reason, with A being the best. There’s also pluses and minuses sometimes. The letters don’t mean anything cool like they do with your O’s and E’s and A’s, and so on. I always enjoy doing homework for history, because I get to research what happened in the muggle world, and then compare it to what was happening in the wizarding world, and try to find connections. Of course I can’t then write those down in the papers, but it’s fun to do it anyway. Yeah, yeah, I know, I’m a nerd._

_Mum’s calling me down for dinner, so I guess I should stop now. Hope you’re having a nice day._

_Sincerely,  
_ _Ravenous J. L._

_P.S. I’m not joking about the tree. I am why it’s there, it was put there for me. Just not to make me behave or anything like your theories, but for a bit of a different reason. Don’t tell anyone._

 

**R.J.Lovable,**

**Do you really want to only eat those pasties forever, or would you like me to send other yumminess from the kitchens? The location of the kitchens is a school secret and it’s one of the many we’ve discovered.**

**Tell me stories about your parents? I want to hear everything about them. I had parents. Telling you I don’t feels good because it dismisses them from me but also it kind of feels like lying to you, which is worse, so the truth is I did have a person I called mother and a person I called father and I lived in their house and they called themselves my parents until recently.**

**I am very happy to be your outlet for procrastination, any time. You are also my favourite, and only, pen pal. I like imagining you like that. Peaceful and surrounded by prettiness.**

**I asked Lily, my friend with the muggle parents, what a pen is and it sounds fake.**

**Yes we wear robes, most of us wear muggle clothing on the weekends, though. And the hats are only expected at formal events. Feasts and ceremonies and things.**

**Heating charms were always one of the easiest for me, it’s cooling charms that give me trouble. I’ve tried practicing and practicing and never get things cold enough. It must be because I’m so hot.**

**I like thinking of you like that, too. Under lots of comfy blankets, toasty and warm while it’s chilly outside.**

**CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR A!!!!! No, I did not know that about the letter grades for muggles, thank you for telling me. I’m so happy for you that you did so well! And yes. That is just about the nerdiest thing I’ve ever heard. Maybe you would be a Ravenclaw if you came here, after all. A bunch of people are doing that with their pen pals. Arguing about who would be in which house and all that. I thought those were the kinds of conversations I’d be missing out on, not having someone from Beauxbatons, but now that they’re happening, I’m feeling very superior talking to you while they’re all around me being so petty about everything.**

**Say hi to your mum for me.**

**S.O.Babe**

**P.S. Excuse me?**

 

_Dear Supplier Of Baked goods,_

_I would love to try other yumminess from the kitchens! You’re the best, thanks._

_My parents have been together since the year dad left Hogwarts, they met in a forest on a sunny autumn day. It sounds very romantic until you get to the part where mum was attacked by a boggart and dad had to save her and the jerk didn’t tell her it was a boggart for the longest time. But he did eventually, and admitted to his wizardness, and she forgave him, and there was a boggart on top of their wedding cake, and they love to tell the story. Basically, they’re losers and I love them. They spend all the possible time together, and even if they’re both super busy with work or whatever, they still make sure that they call each other at least once a day and talk, and they never go to bed angry, and they have at least one date per week. They’re very relationship goals, to be honest, just don’t tell them I said that._

_Pens are not fake. I am writing with one as we speak. I have wrote all my letters with a pen. I am including a pen in this letter, consider it your early Halloween present._

_I’m great at cooling charms! We’d make a good team._

_Thank you! I don’t know, dad always used to say that I’m not going to be in Ravenclaw and that I shouldn’t be disappointed about it, and that he won’t disown me over it. So I guess what’s left it Hufflepuff. But I don’t look good in yellow, so hmph. Maybe it’s best that I’m not there after all._

_Sincerely,_  
_R.J. L._  
_ & H. A. L., the mum  
& L. W. L., the dad_

_P.S. “It must be because I’m so hot.” was the worst thing you’ve ever said_

_P.P.S. Ask Professor Flitwick “Why is the Willow still there if the werewolf never came to school?”_

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Receiver of Jealous Looks,**

**I am the best! I’m sending three school owls, I hope you’re hungry. First one’s more of the same, second is what we’re having for dinner, third is other desserts. There’s heating charms on everything that needs it. Enjoy!**

**That story is disgustingly romantic, I love it. I love that they had a boggart on their wedding cake but also. Isn’t that kind of awful? Like was it a functional boggart? When you approached the cake did it turn into your worst fears? Like in theory that’s the sweetest nod to their relationship, but how did it work practically? I won’t tell them you said that, but I’ll always know your relationship goals.**

**This thing is weird and I am frustrated with it. I’m sending it back. (but thank you for showing me!)**

**We DO make a good team!**

**It most certainly is not best that you’re not here sitting in this common room with me! Talking to you would be much faster than this. Why does that only leave Hufflepuff?**

**Son Of Bees**

**P.S. Hiiiii, everyone!**

**P.P.S. How dare you! I AM hot! That’s totally what makes the difference!**

**P.P.P.S. Is this code for something???? I’m going to ask him anyway, though. I will keep you updated.**

  


_Super hOt Boy*,_

_Yum. I already ate all of it but desserts. Dad had one of the little pies and then went on for an hour about the Hogwarts food, and about a tickling pear?? I don’t know, I wasn’t paying much attention to anything but the food._

_Oh, should have clarified, it wasn’t a real boggart, just a tiny figurine of it, and it was this weird mix of a ghost and a mummy and a snake._

_I can’t believe you returned my gift, how rude!_

_Talking would also be much faster if magic wasn’t so rude as to interfere with technology. I just don’t see myself in Slytherin because I have no ambition, or in Gryffindor, because I’m not all that brave and careless?_

_Desserts await,  
_ _R. J. Lover of food_

_*I’m assuming, since you told me you share a dorm with James and Pete, and you’ve used he/him pronouns for them, and Hogwarts is still doing the binary gender separation thing, but please correct me if I’m wrong._

_P.S. Easy to say that over letters. I’m also smoking hot. See?_

_P.S.S. It’s not a code. Let me know if it gets a reaction._

  


**Ra Ja La,**

**The pear! He knows! How does he know! Tickling (or seductively stroking, as we have learned) the pear is how you get into the kitchens! Which things were your favourites, I can send them any time. In exchange for more of your ugly, delicious cookies.**

**That does sound cute! Unless you’re like deathly afraid of mummies or something, but now I want a tiny, decorative boggart for myself.**

**Well you have to teach me how to use it! It doesn’t work like a quill, it looks all sloppy and squiggly.**

**You think Gryffindors are careless?**

**Sort Of Blue**

**P.S. I believe that you are, why would you lie to me about that?**

**P.P.S. I intend to ask him at charms in the morning.**

  


_Sunshine O. B.,_

_I’ll make more cookies over the weekend and send them to you. I liked the little chocolate brownie ‘crystal’ balls the best. I take after dad when it comes to food, I’m not surprised he figured out how to get into the kitchens._

_You just click it open and write!_

_From what I’ve heard, yeah, a bit? And not necessarily in a bad way, more in a carefree, think of the consequences later, ask for forgiveness not permission, kind of way. What are they/you like in your opinion? How would you describe the Houses? My knowledge is limited, sorry if I said something wrong, and I know it’s oversimplifying things by generalizing a whole bunch of people like that._

_I had to do push-ups in gym class today and everything hurts and I feel like I’m dying._

_Hope you’re having a nicer day,  
_ _Really Jaded L._

_P.S. I am anything but._

_P.P.S. I’m starting to feel a bit nervous about telling you to ask him that. I hope you’ll still want to talk to me._

  


**R.J.L.**

**Are you a werewolf?**

**S.O.B.**

**P.S. I hope that’s not an offensive question, but with the way you were talking and then how Flitwick reacted to me asking that. Is it true?**

**P.P.S. I’m going to respond to your actual letter, too, but this is kind of a big thing to just ask in the middle of a casual conversation.**

  


_S.,_

_Yes._

_R._

_P.S. It’s not offensive._

_P.P.S. The official initials sting a bit though._

  


**Ravishing Jellybean Licker,  
** **Ray of Joyous Light,**

**I want to ask a lot of questions about that, because I’ve never met a werewolf and the one that I knew indirectly is probably not a shining example of the group. But again, I don’t want to be offensive. Oh no, is being weary of offense offensive?? Help me, R.J.L., I’m falling into a deep pit of impropriety and normally I would love that, but if it comes at the expense of your comfort then I want no part of it.**

**Sample questions:**

**1) Were you born a werewolf or is this a more recent occurrence?**

**2) Are there a lot of werewolves near you? In general?**

**3) How deeply does being a werewolf affect your non-full-moon-life?**

**4) Is your being a werewolf the reason you didn’t come to Hogwarts?**

**5) What does any of this werewolf stuff have to do with the murder tree?**

**6) Have I said ‘werewolf’ too much at this point?**

**Socks On Backwards.  
** **Sudden Onset of Boils.**

**P.S. I am including extra initials to make up for last time. I didn’t mean them “officially”, my head was a little full and I couldn’t think of other things.**

**P.P.S. What kind of cookies are you making me??? I’ll send more stuff and definitely include more crystal balls.**

**P.P.P.S. This weekend is a Hogsmeade Weekend, we get to go into the little wizard village near the castle. Do you have many wizard shops near you? Can I buy you candy and stuff? Would that be okay?**

**P.P.P.P.S. I got it open, but the actual act of writing with it was too hard! It’s not stable, it does what it wants! Which is to not write neatly! Apparently!**

**P.P.P.P.S. I’m not careless. I don’t know any Gryffindor that can be described that way. We care more than anything else we do, honestly. Our caring too much is what lands us that reputation because it leads to a lot of erratic behaviors, I think. “Ask forgiveness not permission” sounds like some shite consent logic and I don’t know any Gryffindors that wouldn’t be grossed out by those words. I think Gryffindor bravery gets mistaken for irresponsibility, but that’s not how I see it. It has more to do with not taking shite when people tell us that what’s right isn’t what must be done. My personal irresponsibility is completely separate from my “bravery”.**

**P.P.P.P.P.S. What’s a push up?**

  
  


_Seriously One of the Best people,_

_Hi. I’m both relieved that you responded and are still talking to me, and not really all that surprised, because you didn’t actually seem like the type of bigoted person who would just stop. Still, thank you. I’ve been really enjoying these letters and would hate to lose another good thing because of lycanthropy. I feel like we’ve become friends? We’re friends, right? I can call you that?_

_I dropped a word in there so you have an alternative for when you feel like you’re saying ‘werewolf’ too much, but it doesn’t really bother me. And you can ask whatever question you’d like. I’ve never just told this to any of my friends, it’s all new for me, and it feels good to have it out in the open and not have to hide it._

  * _I wasn’t born a werewolf, nor is this a recent occurrence. I was bit when I was five._


  * __I don’t know any other werewolves personally, and I’m not aware of our numbers.__


  * _It doesn’t. I feel sick a few days before the full moon, and I’m recovering for a few days after, but otherwise I’m just plain ol’ me._


  * _Yes._


  * _Like I’ve told you, dad tried to get me in. And it almost worked. He convinced Dumbledore, and Dumbledore started to make sure that the Ministry couldn’t do anything about it, he provided a safe environment for the students, which was everyone’s main concern. A passage was made that led from the Grounds to a small shack in Hogsmeade, where I’d go to spend my transformations. It was off the school grounds, and safely secured with charms so I wouldn’t endanger the villagers. All up to code. And at the start of the entrance to the passage, the Willow was planted so it would keep away other students, so no one could discover the entry and possibly follow me on a “bad night”. Almost everything was set up, but then the war ended, and suddenly Dumbledore didn’t try that hard anymore. Anytime dad reminded him, and begged him, to finish sorting out all the paperwork, he was busy with something more important. He’s still constantly busy with something more important. Really he’s just trying not to stir things up too much for himself now that I’m of no use to him anymore. Dad told me that when they were talking, he was constantly saying things like how “in these times of war, it’s important to make good connections with all sort of people”. I don’t know, maybe he thought that when I’d be older, I could be of some use to him. After all, wouldn’t I owe him? It makes me feel sick to think about it._



_Tell me more about Hogsmeade? I’ve never been, but I heard it’s absolutely gorgeous. I don’t have any wizard shops near me, so candy would be much appreciated. Dad goes to Diagon Alley sometimes and brings me Honeydukes, which is my favourite. I don’t really like going there, it somehow makes me feel even more alone and isolated from that world. How often do you have Hogsmeade weekends?_

_Sorry for saying all those things about Gryffindors. It didn’t sound that bad to me before, but you explaining it makes it feel the same as if I said that all Slytherins are evil. Again, sorry. The caring too much thing sounds logical, and you do seem like the kind of person who would want to do the Right thing no matter what._

_Push-ups are the worst. It’s this exercise where you’re like lying on the floor and then lift yourself up over and over and over and over and over and over and over again on your hands and front part of your feet / toes.. 1/10 stars, would not recommend._

_Relieved Jocund Lycanthrop_

_P.S. I’m gonna try making chocolate chip cookies this time, will that be satisfactory?_

_P.P.S. Here’s a fountain pen, maybe you’ll like this one better, it should flow more like the quill does._

  


**RaJaLa,**

**Yes we are friends. I’ve been calling you that for the last few letters. When I talk about you out loud to James and Pete and basically whomever will listen. Speaking of which, how common is the knowledge of your lycanthropy? I know you said you’d never told a friend before, so it hasn’t felt like my place to tell anyone, but I also don’t get the feeling it’s a shameful thing you ought to hide. We talk about our writing partners a lot, all of the students, and especially James and Peter and I. So it’s not like it’s come up directly, but it’s the kind of thing I’d normally share with them just in conversation.**

**Do you remember the bite? You are under no obligation to answer that, of course. But five seems young to have such a traumatic, singular moment occur. I still remember terrible things that happened when I was five.**

**Do you miss muggle school on the days you feel sick before/during/after the full moon?**

**That sounds, honestly, like a very good assessment of Dumbledore. He’s magnanimously kind when it suits him, and it’s not that he’s unlikable or hostile when it doesn’t suit him - more like he just seems not to take notice. Divisive kindness, we call it. James and Pete and me. And a lot of people just mistake it for kindness. I’m sorry he did that to you. I hate that he did that to you. He didn’t put in the effort to get you here to be my in-person friend, and now look at you. Forced to do push-ups. Those sound awful and pointless. If I’m lying down, and I make the effort to get back up, why would I then lie down just to do it all over again? This makes no sense.**

**Hogsmeade is like if it’s like this. Do you know the feeling you get when you look at an old painting and you're nostalgic for something you never actually had? A time you never really lived in or a home you never really knew? It’s like seeing a painting of a town long ago when the whole world was on the same page of the book - before muggles surpassed us technologically, when the world was just a little quieter and smaller and closer-knit. When everyone knew everyone else and they all just kind of got along and performed their parts to make a simple, satisfying society. Of course this place never existed and the world was never like that, but Hogsmeade is like stepping into that painting of a nonexistent place. Obviously it’s too big for everyone to know everyone, and the people there are people, not singularly shop proprietors or barkeeps. But it feels like they’re closer to that imaginary place than any society ever has been. And they do their best to make students feel very welcome on weekends we’re allowed there. Yeah, it’s because we bring money with us, but it still feels very wholesome and special. Also nobody there tells the professors if, say, a student shows up out of nowhere on a Thursday night, nowhere near a scheduled weekend, and well past castle curfew.**

**It’s really okay, it stung a bit at first, but I realize there’s no way you could know that those are touchy things to say about Gryffindors. Or that you were talking to one of the only people who might be hurt by it. My whole family is in Slytherin. Well, most of them. I’m the first Gryffindor in our family in the last seven centuries, possibly more. It was a point of much contention in my house until last year when I left.**

**SuOuBu**

**P.S. Chocolate chip cookies sound amazing right now.**

**P.P.S. This is beautiful and perfect. This is the pen equivalent of a training broom. I think if I get used to this, maybe it’s not such a far jump to regular muggle pens from there. Who knows, maybe I’ll be using muggle technological appliances before long! You’re such a good teacher.**

  


_Storyteller O. B.,_

_Hogsmeade sounds absolutely amazing. You’re really good at uncommon descriptions that somehow make perfect sense and completely take me there. Maybe I’ll ask my dad if he could apparate me there sometime. He’s super busy at the moment, but I’m sure he’d find the time for a Hogsmeade trip._

_I do remember the bite, and I still get nightmares about it. It was the middle of the night when I woke up because I was cold, and I looked around and the window was open, and there was a person sitting on the chair across from my bed. I thought it was dad, but it wasn’t. I screamed, but it was too late, he bit me before my parents got to my room. Next thing I remember was waking up in St Mungo’s. Maybe that’s why I hate being cold so much._

_You can tell James and Pete and other friends you’re close to, but maybe don’t mention it to random people just in passing. Thank you for asking. I usually miss the day of the full moon and one before and one after, sometimes more, depends on how bad it was. A bit surprised no one has figured out I’m a werewolf yet, but then again, no one is really that close to me that they’d care that much about why I’m sick every month and check the dates. And I suppose werewolf isn’t that much of a logical conclusion for muggles. I like to think you’d figure it out if I were there._

_Divisive kindness is a very good way of putting it. I told my dad and he agrees. He got mad about it again though, so maybe I shouldn’t have brought it up. I changed the subject to Gryffindors, and how you described them, and he said that makes a lot of sense. I also mentioned the amazing fact of at least seven centuries, and he got a bit weird, he said “that’s cool” and left the room. Is it possible he somehow knows who you could be? Because he definitely left because he’s a huge blabbermouth and literally walking away is the only way he can stop himself from saying too much._

_Your friend,  
_ _R. J. L._

_P.S. I’m glad you like the pen, keep practicing. I borrowed dad’s old quills and ink and tried writing with them, but it was all a big mess. It was also why the following postscript happened._

_P.P.S. I completely burned the first batch of cookies, so here’s half of the second, with a very sad amount of chocolate chips; it’s possible that I was a bit too liberal with them in the first batch._

  


**Rad Just Lazy,**

**I really like “storyteller”**

**Your dad should definitely apparate you to Hogsmeade and he should just happen to do it on a weekend when students are technically allowed to be there. Is that too much? It’s okay if that feels like too much.**

**That’s horrifying. Like something out of a book. I might have nightmares just from imagining it, let alone living with it as an actual memory. I’m so sorry you have to have that memory. I get those a lot – nightmares. Nobody came into my room and bit me but I still dream about the things that did happen and I really wish I wouldn’t. I wish you wouldn’t have nightmares, too.**

**I got you something in Hogsmeade to help with the cold. I put a heating charm on it but that’ll probably only last a few days. I hope it fits, I realized when I was buying it that I have no idea what size you are. In fact I don’t actually know what you look like. Is that as weird to you as it is to me? I know so much about your life and I don’t know how much I know about YOU. So here’s another round of sample questions to that end:**

**1) What colour are your eyes?**

**2) Do you like the smell of rain?**

**3) You said you and your friend go to Moves, right? Is that a club? Do you like to dance?**

**4) What’s your very favourite outfit that to wear?**

**5) Do you prefer sweet or salty?**

**I’ll tell Peter and James next time there’s an opening for it. If you were here, we definitely would have figured it out. Obviously. Because we’d be like best friends, and we’d spend so much time with you that it would be obvious. And also you’d probably tell us because we’d tell each other everything, that’s how close of friends we’d be.**

**If your dad thinks he know who I am just could you tell him that I’m not like he thinks? I’m not like the people he associates with me. Could you tell him not to judge me too hard?**

**Your friend,  
** **Self-conscious Of Bitterness**

**P.S. The cookies were delicious and what are you even talking about? The chocolate to cookie ratio was exactly perfect!**

**P.P.S. Have you tried this nifty fountain pen, for in-between practice?**

  


_S. O. Brilliant,_

_This is now my favourite jumper. I’m never taking it off. It’s so soft and warm and comfy. It was a size too small, but I transformed it. Thank you so much. I don’t really have the money to buy you something in return, but you can have this wolf T-shirt to remind me of you. I only ever wear it to sleep anyway._

_I’ll ask my dad about Hogsmeade. Not yet, I don’t think I’m ready yet, but I do think I’ll want to eventually. Is that okay? Also my dad said that he thinks he knows who you are and wants you to know that he would never judge you based on your ‘family’ and that he thinks what you did is very brave and admirable._

_I’m sorry that you also get nightmares. If you ever want to talk about them, I’m here for that._

_It doesn’t feel that weird to me that we don’t know what the other looks like. I kind of like it, actually. It’s fine that you want to know, and once you do, I’ll want to know about you. I knew that it was gonna come up eventually. But I’m a bit of a mess, and it’s been nice pretending like it doesn’t matter. I can send you my picture, if you’d like, but I’d like to talk to you about something first. I don’t know your name, but do you know mine? Has McGonagall told you it?_

  * _My eyes are green._


  * __I don’t like the smell of rain as much as I like the smell of grass after the rain.__


  * _We go to the movies. Films. Cinema. Moving pictures. Ask Lily about them. / I do not like to dance, I have no dancing skills._


  * _My very favourite is my soft fluffy pyjamas._


  * _Sweet all the way.  
  
_



_Can I ask some questions too?_

  * _What’s your favourite subject in school?_


  * __Do you know what you want to do in life?__


  * _Do you like reading? What’s your favourite book?_


  * _What does a typical Friday or Saturday night for you look like?_


  * _Cats or dogs?_  



_Your friend,  
_ _Ratty Jazzy Lion_

_P.S. You are wrong, that was an absurdly small amount of chocolate chips. But I’m glad you liked the cookies regardless._

_P.P.S. Quills. Are. Dumb. And no practice will ever be enough._

  


**Roaring Jokester Lover,**

**I’m sorry it was small! I bought it in my size. Maybe that was not the right way to go about it.**

**You have time, anyway. The next Hogsmeade weekend isn’t until mid to late December. But even if that’s too soon that would be perfectly okay. And if you have the opportunity to go before then you still should. Nobody else is expecting to meet their pen pals ever at this point. Oh! Update on James, by the way! He got reassigned and he likes this person a lot. Far less uncomfortable.**

**What I did? What does he mean brave and admirable?**

**It feels a little weird only because I was trying to imagine you in the jumper when I was choosing it. If it’s okay with you I think I’d like to hold off on exchanging pictures? You can still talk to me about whatever, though. No, I don’t know your name, that’s why you’re Roaring Jokester Lover. My friends call me Padfoot, you could call me that, too if you want.**

**1) My favourite subject is Transfiguration**

**2) I want to do something that feels good. I just don’t know yet what that might be.**

**3) I like reading fictional, non-school related books, but I don’t have a very large attention span, so I’m more wont to read short stories.**

**4) Fridays look like nights with Peter and James, eating food we’ve liberated from the kitchen and drinking definitely age-appropriate drinks we’ve liberated from Hogsmeade.**

**5) The answer to this question is yes. Both.**

**Your friend,  
** **Soggy Orange Bumblebee  
** **(Padfoot)**

**P.S. I asked Lily and those sound fake, too.**

**P.P.S. Well pens are also dumb, but I’m trying to learn for you.**

**P.P.P.S. Your pyjamas sound very cute.**


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy holidays to everyone, and all the best in 20gayteen!

_ SO Bewitching Padfoot, _

_ I like that nickname, is there a story behind it?  _

_ It’s very okay with me to not send pictures yet. For better imagining, I have blondeish curls, I’m 6’2’’, lanky, awkward, and full of freckles and scars, everywhere, including my face. _

_ The reason why I asked you if you knew my name was that I’m currently in the midst of changing it, because my old one doesn’t fit, it never did. And I don’t really want you to know it. Though you might already, I don’t know. The story of a cute young Scottish girl being attacked by a werewolf who was pissed off at her father was all over, that’s why we had to move, to get away from it. Anyway. Not a girl. My name is Remus. Remus John Lupin. _

_ I’m glad to hear about James, I wish him the best of luck with the new penpal.  _

_ He means how you left home. He didn’t want to say anything more, because it’s not his story to tell, but you already told me that you left, so I asked him if he meant that. And I agree with him, even if I don’t know your situation fully. You told me you don’t have parents, or at least that you don’t think they should be called that, and you have nightmares, and you remember traumatic things from since you were five. I connected the dots, and I’m proud of you that you left. Do you have a safe space to go to during vacations? _

_ Movies aren’t fake, I’ll show you one day, you’ll see. _

_ Your friend,          
_ _ Remus J. L. _

_ P.S. If you don’t like my T-shirt, that’s okay, you can just throw it out. And yes, my pjs are indeed very cute, they have stars on them. _

_ P.P.S. Don’t say it like that, it makes me sounds like a jerk! Ugh. Fine, I’ll try more with the quill. _

  
  


**Remus John Lupin,**

**Remus. Your name is Remus. You’re a werewolf and your name is Remus like the Roman wolf child Remus. I am beside myself. LUPIN Merlin, your last name is Lupin. That’s bold, Lupin. Bold.**

**Yes there is a story behind my name, but it involves a lot of rule breaking and by rules I mean laws and by breaking I mean completely ignoring, so I don’t know how far into that you’d like me to go.**

**You sound adorable and I definitely got you the correct jumper, even if it was small. Are the scars from the lycanthropy thing, or something else? Is it rude to assume they would be from that? I have scars, too, but only one is on my face and it’s little and I hide it.**

**I think you connected the dots accurately. I spent last summer with James’s family and I’m going back at the end of this year. I’ll spend Christmas and Easter hols here, probably.**

**What pronouns should I be using for you?**

**James says thank you and then went on to explain to you all about the new person, but I got bored listening and tuned out, so just pretend I told you about them and they’re great.**

**I would love to see a film at a movie with you. Lily says they’re like plays that are recorded to watch over and over again, like if a picture had been somehow developed with sound? But not like a portrait because those wouldn’t be the same every time. I don’t have a very clear image in my head of what this means, but I’m sure it makes sense.**

**Your friend,  
** **Sirius Orion Black**

**P.S. First of all, you said you wear this shirt to sleep in, why would I throw it out and not just send it back to you if I didn’t like it? Second of all, you can come here and pry this shirt out of my cold, dead, beautiful fingers. This is my new favourite shirt. I look incredibly badarse in this and it’s so soft and comfortable and it smells nice. This is my shirt.**

**P.P.S. Nooo, you’re not a jerk! You don’t have to do anything to prove that to me, not even writing with a quill.**

  
  


_ Sirius Orion Black, _

_ Is that honestly really your name? Sirius? Like the star? That’s so beautiful. Yes, Remus. I picked it because I’m hilarious like that, and I’m a bit done hiding who I am. Glad you like it. He/him, please and thank you.  _

_ If you’re comfortable with sharing it, I’d love to hear the story. I promise I won’t rat out your lawbreaking delinquency to anyone. _

_ Yes, the scars are from lycanthropy, it’s not rude to assume. The wolf takes control at the full moon, and since I’m spending it all locked up it gets bored and when it’s bored it hurts me. I have a few on my face, one pretty deep one across the whole of it, and a bunch on my arms, and legs, and torso, and back. Like I said, all over. I used to try and hide them, but I gave up on that awhile back and I’m trying to live with them. But I’m definitely not adorable, even in the cute sweater that you got me (it’s still keeping me warm, by the way). _

_ I’m glad you’ve got James and his family. Tell him that his new penpal sounds absolutely delightful. _

_ Lily described the movies really well, I think. Film is a synonym for movie, and you can watch them on televisions at home, or for the new ones, you can go to the cinema, the synonym for which is the movies. So we’ll see a film/movie at the movies/cinema. And you’ll get to pick, and I’ll buy you popcorn and coke and candy. _

_ Your friend,  
_ _ Remus the Jolly Loon _

_ P.S. I just thought you might not like it and don’t know how to tell me that because you didn’t mention it in the previous letter. _

**_P.P.S._ _I am writing this with a quill._ **

_ P.P.P.S. That took me ten minutes. I won’t be doing it again any time soon. Sorry for the smudges. _

  
  


**Remus John is Likable,**

**Yes, that’s my real name. It’s the only thing the Blacks ever gave me that I don’t half mind. I love that you chose that name for yourself. Is the John significant? Was your last name already Lupin when you were bit?**

**So in our fourth year, we were running out of ways to discover the castle and grounds just sneaking around on our own, so we did this thing. We sort of came up with this plan. To become animagi. And then we did. So that’s a thing. We’re animagi. Not registered ones. I’m a dog. No particular species, I think it would be interesting to go to a breeder or someone and find out what they have to say about me. I think it would confuse them and I like the idea. But yeah, Padfoot, because the pads of my feet make me a very sneaky puppy. James is Prongs because he’s a stag. Which is very, very useful for forest navigation. And Petey is a rat, which is how we’ve come to discover just about every secret passageway in the castle, we reckon. His nickname is Wormtail.**

**The animal you turn into sounds much less fun. And much much less voluntary. I wish I’d paid more attention in classes when werewolves were brought up because I know very little. Though what we learned in class was only about the “creature” the werewolf, not the Remus John Lupins that they are 29 days per month, and that doesn’t sit right with me.**

**I have six from hot irons on the back of my thighs, and one on my face because she forgot to take off her ring first. But most of my scars aren’t on the outside and I don’t mean that in a very deep, philosophical way, I mean there’s scarring and a propensity for ulcers all along my intestines and stomach because apparently that’s a side effect of some curses.**

**Ugh, James says thank you and then went on and on about the penpal some more.**

**I am looking forward to that movie at the cinema with popcorn and what Lily tells me is a beverage and candy.**

**Your friend,  
** **Sirius Ordinarily Barks**

**P.S. I love the shirt, thank you. It’s my new favourite thing.**

**P.P.S. Your quill work was so good! Loads better than I ever got with that pen. I’d like you to send it back please, so that I can practice more with it, once I’m used to the fountain pen.**

**P.P.P.S. In exchange, I am sending some of Hagrid’s cakes, because we went to visit him earlier and I cannot convince anyone else in the school to try to eat them, so the rest are yours. Please don’t hate me.**

 

 

_ Small Or Big, _

_ YOU’RE A DOG? YOU’RE AN ANIMAGI? WOW. WOWOWOW. ARE YOU FOR REAL? Wow. I. Am so impressed, I did not expect that. Thank you for trusting me with this huge secret. Will you get registered when you’re of age and actually allowed to be that? Wow. Tell me more about your dog form and what that’s like. _

_ Your ‘family’ makes me mad and I want to do very bad things to them and hug you a lot. I’m sorry you had to go through that, I can’t imagine.  _

_ No, we weren’t always the Lupins. The Ministry had a lot of trouble with werewolves around that time, some admittedly because of my dad, and they planned on passing this law for a while, that would allow them to track us and have us in their system, and that our last names would all start with L so that potential employers would know what we were without having to illegally ask us. It never passed, but when dad’s coworkers found out what had happened and with his sudden change of heart and opinion on werewolves, they made it really hard for him. But he didn’t give them the satisfaction to quit, and he started fighting all the laws he was in favour of before, and to shut everyone up and make them see how serious he was about it, he changed his last name to Lupin. Mum agreed, and I was glad they did it later too, made me feel more supported and like I wasn’t alone in this. And John was my mum’s dad’s name. My dead middle name was after my dad’s mum, so it seemed appropriate to flip it and honour my other side of the family too.. And I like how plain it looks in between Remus and Lupin. _

_ Yeah, I read what the textbooks had to say about werewolves and it made me...well, all sorts of things. Angry, and sad, and hopeless, and angry again. Remus John Lupin, a Dark Creature.  _

_ That. Is the worst cake I’ve ever had, please don’t ever submit me to this pain again. I’m sending you some muggle candy as a bribe along with the pen. _

_ Your friend,  
_ _ Rarely Jumpy Lupin _

_ P.S. Say hi to Prongs and Wormtail! _

  
  


**Remus-wolf John Lupin-wolf,**

**I am a smallish-size Sirius with a bigish heart.**

**Yes, I am a dog and I am a very big, fluffy, cute dog. I am the best for cuddles and playing. That’s just facts, I wouldn’t lie to you. I love being Padfoot, it feels so free and light. Sometimes being a person feels like a bit too much to handle and Padfoot puts everything into a much softer perspective. Also he’s a bit on the mischievous side, but that’s all parts of me.**

**I would like to hug you too. I don’t know what else to say about all of this – the bite and the monthly scarring and everything – except that I want to give you lots of hugs. I’m in that stage right now where I feel like I’ve overshared and you’re going to be annoyed by me, but I also know that you’ve shared a lot, too, and that makes it a little easier to believe that this is okay.**

**I love your parents. I can’t imagine people being so thoroughly supportive of their kid like that. Well, I almost can. The Potters – James’s parents – are like that. I think they’d change their name for him. But your parents really did. That’s incredible. They love you so much.**

**John in between Remus and Lupin is incredible and you are a genius.**

**It occurs to me know, we learned about werewolves in Defense Against the Dark Arts of all places, and that doesn’t make any sense? What Dark Arts are being performed by werewolves? I’m imagining you, warm-jumper-wearing, lanky-awkward-chocolate-loving, homeschooled-movie-watching Remus John Lupin sitting up in your room studying the darkest of magical arts now and let me tell you, it’s quite an image.**

**Your friend,  
** **Sirius-dog star Orion Black-dog**

**P.S. I will never send you a cake again. This candy is incredible!**

**P.P.S. You asked what my favourite book was a while ago and I didn’t really have one for you, but you seem nerdy enough to definitely have a favourite book. What is yours?**

 

 

_ Small Oh Barking, _

_ Now I want to hug Padfoot too, he sounds adorable and warm. I think I get what you mean about feeling uneasy when sharing so many personal things. I’ve never told anyone as much as I’ve told you. Maybe it’s partly because it’s letters, and I feel more comfortable writing than talking about it face to face with someone, but I think for the most part it’s because you make me feel like I can. You feel safe, and I trust you, and I’m really honoured that you trust me back, even with knowing everything about me. _

_ Oi, don’t mock my Darkness! I am a Creature of The Night! The Most Terrifying of all who spend whole nights reading long books with a flashlight. There is no way I can pick a favourite book, there’s just too many, I fall in love with new ones every week. At the moment I’m rereading Lord of the Rings. It’s fantasy, which I enjoy, because it’s interesting to compare our world with what muggles think is only fantasy and see if they got anything right, or have gotten close. _

_ They really are wonderful. I talk about you to them a lot, and they say they love you too and you should come to dinner once during the summer. Mum’s amazing on the grill, and dad said to tell you he makes “one hell of a salad”. _

_ Your friend,  
_ _ R. J. L. aka Wolf J. McWolf _

_ P.S. Tell me if you want more candy! _

 

**Roomy Jumper Lover,**

**Padfoot is very warm! You’re going to love me as Padfoot, you’ll see. But human Sirius is pretty warm and good at cuddling, too. Ask anyone. Okay, mostly ask Pete, Jamie, or Lily. I’ve been spending a lot more time with Lily lately. Asking her about all your muggle things has been the start of a lot of much longer, more involved conversations. It’s been really nice, we’ve always been pretty good friends, but I feel really close to her now and it’s a really good friendship, I think. I secretly spent last night in the girls’ dormitory with her and a bunch of other Gryffindor girls and it was the nicest thing.**

**I trust you more the more I know you, Remus, not less.**

**Oh, my mistake. I’m so very frightened of you, Dark Creature of the Night. The powers you must possess – the terrible secrets you must carry. I can’t believe you put all that in the same paragraph as all that nerdy stuff about not being able to pick a favourite book. You’re incredible.**

**I’d like to see Wales and I’d definitely like to meet your parents. But most importantly, I simply MUST try this salad he’s talking about.**

**Solar Opulent Bug**

**P.S. Tell me about Lord of the Rings. How much did they get right? Did they pick up on how dangerous the necromancing werewolves are?**

**P.P.S. I want more candy! What would you like from the kitchens?**

  
  


_ Bright Smiling Oldie, _

_ I can’t wait to meet Padfoot. And you, of course. I mean. I can wait, I still think it’s too soon for me to handle, but at the same time I also really can’t wait. I know that doesn’t make any sense, but it’s how I feel.  _

_ Oooh, a sleepover! Have you ever done that before? Has anyone? I’ve read a lot about the dorms when I still thought I’d be going there, because I was worried they would want to put me in the girls’ dormitory. And it said that there’s a protective charm on the staircase leading up to it, and if boys try to go up there, it turns into a slide. Have they abandoned that old fashioned rule? _

_ Lord of the Rings is very good, in my humble opinion, though it does have some parts that just drag on for foreeeever. From what you’ve told me about your reading preferences, I think it wouldn’t be a good book for you. But if you’ll like movies and won’t get bored or distracted, they did make LOTR movies based on the book(s), so you could try watching those. It’s set in completely its own universe, and you could definitely find some similarities with our world, like giant spiders, but some things are just really funny to me. Like how there’s elves in there, but they’re nothing like our house-elves, they’re these tall, elegant, beautiful creatures who are very wise and immortal.  _ _  
_ _ My favourite character is Eowyn, a human, and a niece of a king. She refuses to stay at home when the war starts, and secretly joins the troops and also takes with her this hobbit (hobbits are like smaller humans), whose fighting skills also no one believes in. And she fights the bad guys, and then her uncle gets injured and this Witch-king, who’s like the scariest bad guy next to The Bad Guy, tried to finish him off, and Eowyn steps in and has this amazing speech. Because there’s this super old prophecy about him, how he’ll never be killed “by a hand of a man”, and he brags about it to her and then she just goes: “No living man am I! You look upon a woman! Eowyn I am, Eomund's daughter. Begone if you be not deathless! For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him!” And then she fucking slaaaaays him. It’s amazing. _

_ Oops, sorry, that got a bit long. And no, no werewolves in that world. I always have mixed feelings about that, reading about werewolves in fantasy books, and it completely depends on what kind of mood I’m in. Sometimes I find it hilarious, and sometimes it makes me angry. I can’t read wizard books about them, those are all bad and make me not only angry without fail, but also sad. _

_ I’m sending you more candy, it’s different ones than last time, so you get some variety. Personally I think variety is overrated and would like more of the chocolate balls. Thank youuuu.  _

_ Say hi to Lily! I’m glad I brought you closer, she sounds really nice, as does your friendship. And hi of course to James and Pete, as per usual. Hmm who else could I say hi to? Oh! Say hi to McGonagall, she’s sure to like that! _

_ Your friend,  
_ _ Reader J. L. _

_ P.S. Do you think you could send me pumpkin juice? Would it survive the trip? I can’t get good one in muggle shops, and dad’s really busy with work and I don’t want to bother him. _

_ P.P.S. What do you do in your free time? What does ‘hanging out’ entail? _

  
  


**Ready Just Late,**

**I know exactly what you mean about not being able to wait but also not being ready. I think I’m a little afraid of this ending when we meet. I like learning about you this way, on your terms, and I like being able to share just the parts of myself that I like enough to share with you. I’m worried that if I meet you in person all of the things I don’t choose to tell you about will become immediately obvious. It’s not that I’m hiding anything from you on purpose, but if I choose to tell you about how much I like being friends with Lily and not how that’s because she’s one of the only people who doesn’t roll their eyes when I start talking, then that’s how I can choose to talk about myself.**

**Oh you know about that rule! The old fashioned one. I was secretly kind of hoping you didn’t because I don’t really know how to explain this. Yeah, it’s still a thing that most boys can’t get up the girls’ stairs in Gryffindor Tower, but some can and I don’t know why. I don’t know anyone else that can do it, either, but I’ve always been able to get up there with no problem. I think others must be able to do it, too, I can’t think of any reason it would be a special power of mine alone. The first time I tried was when I was fourteen and I forgot it was even a rule because it was never an obstacle. Weird, but in a good way because it means I get sleepovers. Sleepovers are technically prohibited, but as long as you’re in the common room or dorm by curfew none of the professors really care.**

**I laughed for about an hour about the elves. I can’t help but imagine my old house-elf, Kreacher, with beautiful long legs and I can’t, I just can’t. But the story sounds really interesting, from what I could follow of what you said. I would really like to read that if it were, like, bite-sized. Is Eowyn the main character? Because I really, really like her.**

**I’ve never read wizard fiction about werewolves. Now that you mention it I kind of want to, to see what it’s like, but that’s just morbid curiosity. I won’t, I promise.**

**Your crystal balls have been sent, they’ve been on their way for a while now, but I think Bird is slower, so Fa will probably get there with this letter first. Bird is also carrying your pumpkin juice, which I had Jamie put a cooling charm on because his are more effective than mine.**

**I said hi to everyone for you, Lily sends her love, as does James, Peter says “hullo”, and Minnie says “sit down, Mr. Black, class has begun!” but then she also said to send her regards, later.**

**Your Friend,  
** **Sings Opera Badly**

**P.S. Hanging out at Hogwarts entails listening to the wireless and talking about whatever. Exchanging recreational spells and practicing them and trading potions with your friends. For Wormy, Prongs, and me it means a lot of research on the castle and of, shall we say, more ambitious magic. We haven’t had a big project since the animagus thing, though. I kind of miss that.**

  
  


_ Smells Of Begonias, _

_ I think I'd really enjoy hanging out with you, and working on a big project together, I've never really experienced something like that, and it sounds fun. Maybe your next project could be getting me into Hogwarts :P _

_ People who roll their eyes at you sound like jerks and I want to duel every single one of them personally.  _

_ You can read it if you're curious, I wouldn't mind. I know you know better than to think anything it says is true.  _

_ Eowyn is sadly just a side character. There's like four layers of side characters, she's in the third. _

_ Fa and Bird came together! It was very cute. Until half a second later when I took the letter from Fa before I took the package from Bird. They did not like that. Now I'm bleeding.  _

_ Thank you so much for my dinner! I'm home alone, so I'll enjoy it downstairs in front of the TV, watching reality shows; they're my guilty pleasure. Basically what they are is a bunch of real people, not actors, competing for a prize through a bunch of different challenges. There's cooking shows, and model shows, and survivor shows where they get put on a deserted island or something, and fashion designers shows, etc. My current favourite is the Great British Bake-off, where they bake cakes, and cookies, and bread. And there's no actual prize in this one, like usually people get money and expensive things, but this is just for the honour of it. And there's no unnecessary drama, there's a lot of fighting and backstabbing in some shows, but here they're all really supportive and become great friends, and the judges are kind too, most of the time. It does make me want to eat a lot of cake, though. _

_ I feel like people might get annoyed by my constant hellos and don't see the point in them. But whatever, say hi to everyone anyway. _

_ Your friend,  
_ _ Rarely Jealous Lump  _

_ P.S. I've been wondering this since I was 11 and I read my Hogwarts letter. Does anyone actually bring a toad to school?? _

  
  


**Royal Jester to the Lord,**

**If you’re going to duel every single person in Hogwarts for rolling their eyes at me, then is it really best for you to come here? I think you’d love it here, though. Being at school here, even this late. I know you were joking, but I can’t help but picture it, and I think everyone would adore you and you’d be so nerdy about everything. Oh, Merlin, I just imagined you walking into the library. That adventure would be an entire year on its own, I think.**

**There should be entire books about Eowyn and they should be novellas so that I could read them without being overwhelmed. I would rather read that than werewolf stories. I was looking through them in the library just for a laugh and they’re so bad. It’s not like there’s a section of entirely werewolf novels in the library, but I was looking through the catalogue by subject and everything is either about a hero heroically destroying a terrorizing werewolf or a heroine “taming” a “wild” one with her romantic wiles. I don’t know which part of all of it is most disturbing to me. I won’t be picking any of those up, not even for a laugh. And I will be harshly judging anyone I see with one.**

**I’m really sorry about Bird. I think they take after me like that.**

**I’m trying really hard to understand what a reality show is, between your description and Lily filling in the confusing parts. She says it’ll make more sense once I see one for myself, and I think she’s right. I like the idea of the baking one where everyone gets along, though.**

**Nobody is annoyed by your “hello”s. Everyone is only flattered that you mentioned them by name or thought of them enough to say it, every time. And they always say hi back, but I always forget exactly what they say to tell you by the time I’m writing your next letter.**

**Your friend,  
** **Salad or Beverage**

**P.S. Does anybody bring a toad. DOES ANYBODY BRING A TOAD? My lycanthropic friend, I am so glad you asked. When we came to Hogwarts, the answer was “no”. Not a single toad in the castle, no one in any year had one. Then. Professor Slughorn told us a story. In our third year. It was about how “toad” came to be upon the list of acceptable animals one could bring to Hogwarts. You see, back in ANCIENT and VERY DARK times, students were required to bring toads to school as potions ingredients. Potions ingredients. To be cooked and used in classwork. They would store them with the bloody lacewing flies and lavender seeds. Eventually students had had enough of that animal cruelty and like fifty or sixty years ago they disallowed them to be brought as ingredients and as a measure of good will, said that the students could take a toad with them to school and raise it as a pet and never have to throw it in a cauldron. Nobody ever did, maybe six students throughout Hogwarts history ever brought toads as pets. Well. We were outraged. Some of us were sobbing (me) and lots of people were yelling and throwing things (it probably was less dramatic, but this is how I remember it. We were thirteen, mind you). And it stayed with us. And the next weekend was a Hogsmeade weekend. So as a collective, our entire year. ENTIRE YEAR. Every student from every house. As a collective, we all purchased tadpoles from the creature shop in the village. Students who couldn’t really afford one had one purchased by another student (by which I mean James, he bought like fifty) and we all brought our new pets back to the castle. It was beautiful and brilliant. And it lasted about a month. Eventually people started to realize they didn’t ACTUALLY want to have a toad as a pet. So we arranged with Hagrid to set up a little toad habitat in the forest and almost all of them live there, now. We still go visit, sometimes, James, Peter and me. We can pick our toads out from across the pond. A bunch of people kept them, there are still something like a dozen or two dozen toads hopping around the castle these days.**


	4. Chapter 4

_Seldom Ordinary Bloke,_

_The toads story is absolutely amazing, I'm so glad I asked. Did you name yours? I've never had any other pets than Fa.. I got him as a “feel better” present when I learned I wasn't going to Hogwarts. Which really made no sense, because who was I gonna send letters to if I was home? He was really excited when this project started and I told him he'd have a regular “job” now._

_I'm sorry I keep badly describing muggle things to you. I'll try to do better. Until then I'm glad you've got Lily to help. And don't worry about Bird, we'll be friends eventually, I just know it._

_I have to write an essay I've been postponing doing for a week now, wish me luck!_

_Your friend,_  
_Running J. Late_

_P.S. Hi to James, hullo to Peter, hey to Lily._

 

**Reliable Just and Loyal,**

**Oh, Remus, no! You’re excellent at describing things, it’s not your fault I can’t imagine. I have no basis for these muggle things, I have nothing to start with. That’s not your fault, it’s mine, and it’s not mine it’s other people's’. I don’t know if your dad told you or how much, but the people who raised me are anti-muggle in a big, big way. I was never allowed near muggles or muggle inventions or anything. I tried to take muggle studies in school and that didn’t end well. And then even this past summer, when I was finally away from them, James goes into the muggle village near his home a lot and I was too deep in my own depression to go with him, so even now that I’m not under their muggle-hating shadow anymore, I still have had basically no interaction with anything outside the tiny wizarding world. So it’s my fault I don’t have any idea how the rest of the world works. You and Lily and everyone else I ask about these things just try your hardest and I love learning what I can.  
**

**Fa is wonderful, even if they didn’t get to do much letter carrying until now. I liked having Bird for companionship, even when I was forbidden from using them for mail carriage. We’re not tiring Fa out too much?  
**

**Good luck on your essay! What is it about?**

**Your friend,  
** **Short OddBall**

 **P.S. Everyone says hello back and Marlene, she’s a Hufflepuff friend, is very upset that you haven’t said hello to her specifically, yet. She doesn’t care that I haven’t ever mentioned her by name.  
** **P.P.S. I have a meeting with McGonagall tomorrow morning to talk to her about lots of things. Wish ME luck.**

 

_Strange Ominous Balloon,_

_Good luck! It's noon so it's no use, the meeting already happened, but like they say, it's the thought that counts. How was it? What did you talk about? Do these meetings happen often? Does she feel like something more than a teacher, since she's the Head of your house?_

_I can't imagine what it's like not knowing about muggle things, I've been surrounded with them since forever, so they're as normal to me as magic is. I think you shouldn't feel too bad about it though, you get to discover it all now, and that's gonna be exciting. If you like just hearing about it, wait til you experience it all first-hand, it's gonna be amazing. I knew about magic and I was around it, but there were some things I didn't experience til I was older, like Diagon alley; the first time I went was when we went to buy school supplies. And it was unbelievable, and looking back on it, I'm glad I saw it then first, it made it more special than if I'd had gone there with my dad when I was younger. Though in retrospect it was also a very sad trip; the robes from Madam Malkin’s were hanging untouched in my closet for years._

_We're not tiring Fa out, he always kept in good shape, hoping, dreaming, and praying for an opportunity like this to arise. This is his moment to shine, I dare not suggest to him to take a breather._  
_The essay was about the motif of suicide in the books we’ve been discussing in class, very cheerful stuff._

_A big hi, hey, and hello to Marlene of Hufflepuff, and a deep and most sincere apology for not greeting her sooner. I'm enclosing a yellow rose from our garden as further apology (the pink one is for you, just because). And a “what's up” nod to everyone else._

_Your friend,_  
_Regret Jumping a Lot_

_P.S. What's your favourite flower?_

 

**Rude Like James,**

**I talk to McGonagall a lot. She does feel like more than just another teacher, but it’s not because she’s my head of house. Well, not only that, anyway. There’s an ongoing joke about how I’m in love with her and once I leave Hogwarts we’re going to be married and I’m going to have her babies, but aren’t you a lucky duck, you get the real story. Minerva McGonagall was the first person to tell me my parents were wrong. In the beginning of second year, I came back with a bad attitude and a few more scars. The not noticeable ones. I acted out a lot and subsequently landed in detention a lot, but I think some of the detentions I got she gave me on purpose. She’s never said, but there were a few I felt I really hadn’t earned, and on those occasions the punishment was never harsh, or even unpleasant. I know now it was because she was keeping an eye on me. A lot of adults had known about the things my parents used to do to me – mostly my mum. People at St. Mungo’s definitely knew. My parents’ friends knew, some of the workers at places we went on holiday, shop owners at places we frequented. Lots knew, and they all had this look, this sad look like pity but worse. They’d all give me that look and then look away, or down, or somewhere not at me. Never back to me, always silent. When Minerva had me checked by Madam Pomfrey – she’s the healer that runs the Hospital Wing at Hogwarts – and it became clear where my ulcers were coming from, she had that look but she never looked away. She looked at me with those sad eyes and she told me it wasn’t my fault. Since then I meet with her a lot just to talk about stuff. Sometimes once per week, sometimes more, sometimes less. But anyway, back to the main point. The reason I’m dramatically in love with her. I think it was third year. We were having a practical lesson and she was going around the room giving instruction. It was a lesson we had with the Slytherins, which meant it was a lesson we had with a bunch of my cousins. I wasn’t doing the spell quite right, whatever it was, and she came over and told me how to do it correctly and without thinking, my response was “Thanks, Professor, I love you”. And everything got real quiet and then a bunch of people were laughing and I couldn’t have that, I couldn’t let them turn the one good adult I had into something to make fun of me for. So I turned it into something fun and funny and it only annoys her a lot, but she always smiles before she dismisses it. So yeah, if you ask anyone in Hogwarts, “Does Sirius Black have extra-professorial feelings about Minerva McGonagall” anyone would tell you “yes”, but now you’re one of five people that know exactly why.  
**

**This morning our talk was largely about you. More specifically how I want to know what a cinema movie looks like. I was forbidden from taking Muggle Studies as a subject when I was selecting what classes I would take at Hogwarts, and I’m in sixth year, now, I’m supposed to be taking N.E.W.T. levels in all my classes. But I want to learn and far be it from her to stop a student learning, so guess what? I’m going to join the third years in Muggle Studies classes once a week every week, now. I won’t be graded for my efforts, but I’ll be expected to participate and maintain homework and if I’m not doing those things I will no longer be invited to audit the class, but, Remus, I’m totally going to do this.  
**

**Do you still have the robes? How small do they look now that you’re lanky and awkward?  
**

**Fa is doing great, I never tell him otherwise.  
**

**Your essay subject sounds horrible. Was it horrible? Or was it at least a bit interesting?  
**

**Marlene! Smiled! Actually smiled! Not grimaced or smirked, but smiled! You have done it, you have achieved the impossible. I think this means you’re legally headmaster, now. She loves the flower and I love mine, thank you. Everyone is fighting over your “what’s up” nods, ,now.**

**Your friend,  
** **Survivor of Breakage**

**P.S. Well, now my favourite flower is this one. Not necessarily this type, but this very specific flower. It’s mine and I’m keeping it forever.**

 

_Student Of Bravery,_

_I'm glad you liked the flower, and I'm very proud of myself that I made Marlene smile, even though I didn't know that was a special thing to do. What is she like? Right now I'm imagining this tiny grumpy feisty being who curses everyone who looks at her wrong. Is she in your year? You mentioned that one class and that you had it with Slytherins, is that common? Do you have different subjects with different Houses? How does that affect the lessons? I've always imagined that since students are sorted based on their personalities, the lessons are different for each House, because you absorb knowledge differently. Like for Hufflepuffs there would be a lot of group work where they could help each other, and for Slytherins the environment would be more competitive. Is it anything like that?_

_Thank you for trusting me with your McGonagall secret. I'm really glad you have her. I'm gonna tell you a secret in return. This started as a silly stubborn thing, but the more I've thought about it over the years, the more I truly want it. To be a teacher. Preferably at Hogwarts. They're not letting me learn, but maybe I could get them to let me teach. And I could try to make sure that they'd accept all kids, even if they're technically on the list of Dangerous Creatures. And I could talk to them and make them tea and be their McGonagall. I know it's a long shot, but I still want it._

_You're gonna take Muggle studies!! Sirius, that's amazing! I have no doubts that you can do this and do it great, and I'll help you with homework if you'll need it. I'm proud of you for doing this. You tried before and they stopped you, but you're doing it now anyway. Just don't let it get to your head when tiny third years treat you like a god._

_The essay was okay, I guess. I wrote one, but at the end I felt like I shared too much personal stuff, so I wrote a second, much worse and much more boring one, but one I felt more comfortable handing in. I'll still probably get an A._

_I don't have my robes anymore, or my hat. A couple of years back my mum’s coworker's son wanted to be a witch for Halloween, so I donated my very finely made “costume”. I saw pictures, he looked very cute._

_Your friend,_  
_Rude Jokes Loather_

 _P.S. Speaking of, and it being just around the corner, what's Halloween like at Hogwarts?_  
_P.P.S. Hugs for everyone who's a hugger, a nice warm hello to the rest._

 

**Reckless Jewel Lust,**

**If Marlene ever heard you use the words “tiny” or “feisty” to describe her, you’d wake up in the hospital wing a week later with no idea of what hit you, literally. You’re right that she’ll curse anyone who looks at her the wrong way, though. She’s tall and she has a very low tolerance for annoyance and a very dry sense of humor, but it’s a GOOD sense of humor. As long as you can handle the roughness of her edges, she’s one of the best friends you’ll ever have. She’s fun and she cares and she understands things on a level most people our age just seem to not. Yes, she’s in our year. The Beauxbatons guy she’s writing with is very boring. She tells him that all the time.  
**

**During the beginning your letter, when you said the things about teaching the students differently according to houses, I was thinking that you should be a professor. Remus. You should be a professor. That’s, I think, a very achievable goal. I think you would make an incredible professor. You could be every kid’s McGonagall. Though she’d have to also be McGonagall, she’s never dying and she’s never leaving Hogwarts, I can’t think about any universe in which those things aren’t true. As far as I know, the classes are all just taught the same and splitting up by house is just an easy way to break us down into manageable class sizes. Usually we have classes with our house and our year, but some lessons are double lessons, which means doubled time, two hours, and doubled students, two houses of the same year. This year is different because it’s N.E.W.T. levels, so it’s all the houses mushed together because there’s less people in each class.  
**

**I will definitely take you up on that homework offer. I’m less inclined to think that the third years will think I’m a god, more inclined to think that they’ll think I’m big and stupid for being in a third year class as a sixth year. We’ll see. My first class is on Wednesday.  
**

**You can feel free to just not answer this, just skip it if you want, but was the personal stuff in that essay related directly to the subject matter? I’m exhausted for you that you wrote two entire essays.  
** **It was really sweet of you to give the kid your robes like that.**

 **Yours,  
** **Sneaky Oil Business**

 **P.S. Halloween is a huge feast here. Lots of decorations in the hallways and stuff, and we’re not necessarily encouraged to dress up but some of us do and it’s amazing and wonderful.  
** **P.P.S. I just hugged everyone in the entire tower. Except for three people whom I gave warm hellos, but Merlin, that was a lot of hugging. So much hugging. The first years formed a line, Remus. And this was just the Gryffindors. Merlin.**

 

_Strolling Over Bridges,_

_I can't believe that's how you chose to interpret my hugs, obviously I meant everyone of your friends we've previously talked about, not literally everyone! You're amazing. Please don't ever tell Marlene I wrongly described her like that, I get enough hospital hours in as it is._

_You really think I could be a professor? Really and completely honestly? Of course there can only be one original McGonagall, I wouldn't ever dream of replacing her in any way, least of all Transfiguration teaching; ironically, it's not one of my best subjects. I think I'd like to teach either Charms or Defense, if they'd let me change the curriculum. Potentially History, but I feel like I could do less interesting things with that. Plus, the position is taken by a ghost. That guy’s not leaving anytime soon._

_Hey, what are your N.E.W.T. classes, anyway? I'm taking Charms, Defense, Arithmancy, Runes, and Transfiguration (I'm not great at it, but I'm not the worst, and it's interesting, so I try my hardest). Is it better now that you're in mixed classes with all of the Houses or worse? Do you have at least one friend in each class with you? And I really wouldn't worry about Muggle studies, they'll think you're great. If they don't, they're dumb kids who don't know better yet. Also you could offer to help them with homework for other subjects as a bit of a bribe, or teach them a cool spell they won't learn in class, that ought to get you on their good side._

_You mentioned detentions before and I forgot to ask you about them, what kind of things do they make you do? From how you were talking about them it seemed like it’s not just writing lines or sitting quietly not being allowed to do anything._  
_Yes, the personal stuff was directly connected to the subject matter. It's something that I've thought about and struggled with in the past. I've never attempted it, and I'm doing better now. I'm taking meds for depression, and I go see a psychiatrist every month. That's like a doctor for your mind. And a doctor is a healer. And with meds I mean medicine, mine comes in the shape of little pills that I take with breakfast every day._

_Are you one of the people who dress up for Halloween? What has been your best costume? I get the feeling that you and James and Pete are the kind of people and friends who do group costumes. I always liked Halloween, I guess because I got to pretend I was something that I'm not, but this will be the first year I'll be dressing up since I was a kid; I've been invited to a party by a classmate. Care to guess what I'll be going as?_

_Yours,_  
_Round Jelly Lollipop_

_P.S. Good luck in your first class tomorrow!!_

**Raging Joke Laughter,**

**I made it through all of Ravenclaw today, or at least as much as I could get without actually going to their common room. You have hugged so many people, Remus. It’s disturbing. Tomorrow you’re going to hug all the Hufflepuffs. I keep trying to tell people that this is on your orders, that you’re the weird one, not me, but I don’t think they believe me.  
**

**Yes. You would be an excellent professor. You’re a bookish nerd who writes two versions of essays and decides which to hand in and you believe people should be taught according to their personalities and you take the time to describe things and teach about them when you know I won’t understand otherwise.  
**

**My N.E.W.T. classes are Transfiguration, Potions, Charms, Divination, and Astronomy. I don’t mind the house-blended classes so much as I mind who it means I get stuck with. So it used to be I’d maybe have one class per year where I was stuck with the Slytherins twice a week, but now I have three classes with Bella, that’s my cousin. We leave each other alone for the most part, now.  
**

**Are those normal muggle detentions? Here it’s different. It’s up to the accusing professor to decide punishment, and sometimes it’s little things like alphabetize this or that catalogue, and sometimes it’s big things, like polish every trophy in the trophy room without magic. Sometimes it’s less safe things, like doxy-spray the quidditch shed. It varies.  
**

**Does medicine help like potions? I’m sorry you’ve felt like that. I’ve felt like that. I want to do the hugging you thing again. Guess I’ll settle for every Hufflepuff instead.  
**

**Oh, Remus, of course we dress up for Halloween. This year we’re going as Beedle characters, I’m Babbity Rabbity. It’s going to be so good. What are you going as?! I want to guess, but I honestly have no idea.**

**Yours,  
** **Spooky Old Babbity**

**P.S. I’m on my way to Muggle Studies now! Right now!**

 

_Beware! Scary One,_

_Merlin’s pants, will you stop telling people you're hugging them in my name! My reputation doesn't need any help. Save your hugs for me, I need and want them. Also thank you for supporting my teaching idea, it means a lot._

_You leave each other alone now, what does that mean? Does she share your biological parents’ beliefs? How about all your other cousins? Surely there's more than just one of you sane ones?_

_Also ew, potions. Gross. As in the subject, not the healing substance. Yes, medicine helps like that. I'm sorry you've felt that way too. I know it's awful of me to say this, but a tiny bit of me isn't completely sorry, because I know you understand and won't think bad about me because of it. We'll need to do so much hugging when we meet in person, Merlin._

_Your costume sounds amazing. I'm going as a werewolf disguised as a vampire._

_Yours,  
_ _Ruler Justly Listens_

 _P.S. Tell me how the class went._  
_P.P.S. Enclosing some pumpkin soup I just made from the pumpkin I just carved, and a picture of the pumpkin. Tried to put a heating charm on it, but gave up on it eventually. Bon appetit._

 

**Rejected Jam Liquor,**

**No, I will not stop hugging people in your name, tomorrow we’re on to the Slytherins. I’m a bit nervous about this one because there’s a handful that are not my best friends, but you said hugs to EVERYONE so that’s what’s going to happen. Speaking of which, yeah, Bella is my closest cousin who’s in my year, but I have a lot of family in the school. All of whom share the familial ideology. My cousin Andy isn’t like that, but she left school four years ago.  
**

**Potions isn’t so bad!  
**

**I would never think badly of you, not for that and I believe, at this point, not for anything. What’s the worst thing you can think of about yourself? I bet I still wouldn’t think badly of you if you told me. But I really do understand being that low. I don’t know if everyone does. I hope not.  
**

**Merlin’s beard, of course you are. Are you actually going as that or are you the werewolf and you’re just wearing a vampire costume? Because werewolves don’t look like anything but freckly nerds? Incredible.**

**Yours,  
** **Sly Old Bean**

 **P.S. Class was wonderful! We’re learning about muggle school systems, and it didn’t come up in class so I asked the professor after if she could tell me what a movie is like and she showed me! It wasn’t a real movie, because the things you need to see a movie don’t work at Hogwarts, but it was a magical representation of one and I am very, very excited to see one with you now.  
** **P.P.S. Your soup is delicious! I heated it up myself and it was comforting and sweet and perfect. I’m sending back the GOOD pumpkin juice in trade.**

 

_Sender Of Baskets,_

_I'm so so glad the class went great! And it's really cute how excited you are about it. Yes, Potions are that bad. And sorry about your cousins. I hereby officially change my wish to hug everyone who wants it AND everyone you want to. If Slytherins are happening today, does that mean tomorrow it's professor's turn? I'd like to hear how that will play out._

_I think you already know the worst things about me. So I guess we're good, and you're stuck with me._

_I'm the werewolf, of course. I'm putting the finishing touches on my costume right now. The party is on Saturday, I'm a bit nervous about it, but also excited._

_Pumpkin soup is my specialty, and you can get more whenever you want, I make it all the time._

_Yours,  
_ _Raven Just Landed_

_P.S. Happy Halloween!_

 

**Reminder of July Leisure,**

**The class is perfect. We even talked about PE and I told everyone what a push up is and they were very impressed with me and so was I. Next week we'll be discussing the letter grading system and I already know that too! I’m practically a muggle, when do I get my certificate?  
**

**I got your letter after all of the Slytherin hugging, oops. Luckily none of them wanted to hug me anyway, so I gave a lot of hearty handshakes. I did skip one person on purpose, though. Sorry. I couldn’t bring myself to approach my brother, even in the over-the-top-joking manner I did with everyone else. I figured you’d understand. I will absolutely let you know how the professors go tomorrow. The real fun comes with the ghosts and the house-elves the day after.  
**

**Oh, yay! I like being stuck with you. It’s worked really well for me so far. What is a muggle Halloween party like? What will this one be like?  
**

**Halloween night was AMAZING, we were, of course, the best dressed. The feast was fantastic and then we brought the party back to Gryffindor Tower, but only for a bit. There were too many of us, it was stuffy up here. So after hours we snuck back down to the Great Hall, all in our costumes. And by snuck, I mean over seventy of us. We played games and there was dancing, though the music was somewhat lacking, since none of us had thought to bring a wireless. People took turns being the music, it was dreadful and wonderful. It only lasted an hour, we were not being subtle at all. The only reason it took that long to shut us down is that it took six professors shooting sparks to get our attention. It was fabulous.**

**Yours,  
** **Symbol Of Beauty**

**P.S. I would like to request that every time you make your pumpkin soup, you send me just a little bit of it. I really like it.**

_Secret Of Brothers,_

_I'm sorry, but you have a brother? Is he older than you? Does he also share familial beliefs? I'm assuming yes and also that he still lives at home, since you haven't mentioned him before. Do they hurt him like they did you? I'm sorry, I know this is none of my business, it just took me by surprise._

_The party sounds amazing. Mine was nice as well. The stereotypical muggle party, and the kind you'll see in movies, involves too big of a crowd of people, a lot of drinking, music being too loud to actually enjoy it, and some making out. That was the party that was happening across the street. The one I went to was small, just around ten people, the music was enjoyable, half the people didn't feel like drinking and no one judged us for it, and we just talked a lot and played board games. No one was brave enough, or felt like, dancing. And there was some making out. We all ended up staying over, just sleeping wherever we found a comfy horizontal surface, and we all helped clean up in the morning, then went out to have breakfast. It was a really good experience, I'm glad I went._

_You'll get your muggle certificate at the end of the school year, when you pass your exam. The professor might not give you one to take, but I will._  
_I don't think you know what you're getting yourself into with this soup request, I make it literally twice a week, but I will honour it. You can expect a delivery by Owl #247 aka dad's work owl aka Miss Mary Feathers, tomorrow._

 _Yours,_  
_Railway to Juxtaposed Lands_

_P.S. Good luck on your seemingly never ending hugs mission._


	5. Chapter 5

**Rose Juniper Lilacs,**

**I have a brother. His name is Regulus and he doesn’t call me his brother anymore. He’s younger. He’s incredibly smart. He’s in Slytherin. He thinks my parents are gods, I think. It’s the only explanation. He’s way too smart for them and their opinions, but he follows them blindly anyway. We haven’t spoken since I left home last year. He still lives with them, yes.**

**I like imagining your party. What kinds of games do muggles play? Are there any you think I’d be able to learn? Are they difficult? Do muggle relationships work like wizard ones? You said there was some snogging, is monogamy less prioritized, or was all the snogging done amongst partners? Sorry for all the questions, I’m trying to create a picture in my mind of what a muggle social gathering might look like.**

**Remus, why do you hate these owls? Why do you insist upon names like Miss Mary Feathers? I’m naming the next numbered work owl from your dad’s office “Trent”.**

**Yours,  
** **Sunflower Orchid Buttercups**

**P.S. Yes please, bring on the soup.**

**P.P.S. Did you personally do any of the snogging at the party?**

**P.P.P.S. My hugs mission needs no luck, thank you very much. I’m doing quite well. Had to postpone it a bit, but I’ll be back on track on Monday.**

  
  


_ Sunrise Overlooking the Beach, _

_ Muggles play all sorts of games, and some are similar to wizard ones, for example chess is basically the same, just that in the muggle one, you have to move the pieces yourself. We mostly played different card games, charades, and pictionary. In charades you get something written on a paper, a famous person everyone knows, or a book, or a movie, it can be anything really, and then you have to nonverbally show someone what it is, and they try to guess it. And pictionary is the same, but you have to draw the thing. I don’t see why you couldn’t learn them just as easy as any muggle, not many of them require any specific muggle knowledge. _

_ The relationships work the same, and monogamy is still mostly the only socially acceptable form of romantic relationships, though mostly younger generations are slowly rebelling against it, which I support; polyamorous relationships may not be for me personally, but I know they can work very well and are perfectly healthy. At this particular party there wasn’t really all that much making out, just the one couple that was in our midst really went for it. But I’ve heard that wasn’t the case across the street, there was quite a drama with some popular cheerleaders and their jock boyfriends. No, I didn’t personally participate in any snogging myself, but I did kiss a girl on a dare, why? _

_ Were you close with your brother when you were younger? I’m sorry if you don’t like talking about it, you of course don’t have to answer it. You never have to answer anything that makes you uncomfortable. It’s just that I’ve always wanted a sibling, and I guess I’m romanticising that kind of relationships and want all of them to be perfect and think it’s a waste when they’re not. I’m sorry, I’ll shut up about it now. But just by the way, your name is prettier than his. _

_ What are you talking about?! Those are some great owl names! No way is the next one gonna be named Trent, that’s so boring. That’s a cis straight white rich boring douchebag lawyer who works for other cis straight white rich boring douchebag criminals kind of name, not a cute owl name. _

_ Yours,  
Red Jade Lilac _

_ P.S. A lawyer is a person who is chosen or assigned to a person who is accused of something illegal, and their job is to defender them. On the other side you also have lawyers who work for the person doing the accusing. To put it simply, it’s like you’d be assigned a personal Wizengamot member to defend you, so you don’t have to defend yourself. Which is useful, because they actually know how the law works much better than you do, because they go to school for it. And you don’t have to be just alone at the trial with no one on your side. On the other hand it also makes sure someone can’t just walk away freely because half the Wizengamot was fucking bribed, and no one is brave enough to say it or do anything about it because they’re not obligated by their specific job to fucking do so. Sorry. They let Greyback go and I’m still bitter about it. _

 

 

**Rainbow Jukebox Listening,**

**I absolutely love how charades sounds, I want to play that. And the one that’s drawing instead, too! Pictionary. I want to play that, I love to draw. When we do meet, will you teach me to play? Is it okay that I think about that a lot? It seems very abstract most of the time and then sometimes it feels like ‘yes, of course I’m going to meet this person who is my friend, who is important to me’.**

**Parties like that seem stressful to me. I don’t much like being around people being physically affectionate like that. It’s not everyone and it’s not always, but sometimes it makes me uncomfortable. Was your dare kiss nice? Do you kiss a lot of girls?**

**Reg and I were close. Really close. It felt like us against them when we were little. But then it wasn’t. They stopped hurting him, or at least they stopped hurting him in the same, obvious ways they hurt me. We didn’t speak for a long time. He wouldn’t talk to me over the last summer I spent in the house with them. And then last year, when I left, I tried to talk. I wanted to take him with me. But he just looked at me. He never said a word. So I walked away. I haven’t really been able to look at him yet this year.**

**That is the beauty of Trent! It’s like naming an owl Robert. Or Harold. It’s brilliant, how are you missing this???**

**I’ve been following the Greyback case, too. He’s the one I mentioned that one time – the werewolf I know indirectly, but whom is probably not a shining example of werewolf culture. My parents, The Blacks, knew him, not very well, I don’t think.**

**Yours,  
** **Silver Oak Bunny**

**P.S. Do you know Greyback for the reason it now occurs to me to think you do?**

  
  
  


_ Space Odyssey Begins, _

_ Of course I’ll teach you how to play, and of course we’ll play some day. It’s completely okay with me that you think about that a lot, I do too. I want to exist in the same place you do. _

_ I don’t mind people being physically affectionate around me, but I don’t like being the one who is physically affectionate in front of other people, not in a romantic way, at least. My dare kiss was nice; short and sweet. Including this dare kiss, which was my second dare kiss ever, I’ve kissed three people, one of them more than once. _

_ Do you think there’s still a chance for you and your brother? If he came to his senses? I just have this huge urge to shake him and try to make him see what he’s missing not having you in his life. _

_ Yes, that’s how I know Greyback. _

_ So now that it’s not Hallowmonth anymore, it’s Christmukkahmonth (November is the worst and most boring month of they year, it’s just there for a filler so the weather can catch up and change from orange autumn to white december), do you celebrate any wintery holidays? I know you said you’ll spend them at Hogwarts this year, do a lot of students do that? I can’t really imagine not spending them at home. Anyway, even if you don’t celebrate anything, I’m still going to get you something. December without gifts is just too sad. _

_ Yours, _

_ Raccoon Jaguar Llama _

_ P.S. This letter was brought to you by Bob. Happy? _

 

 

**Recorded Jazz Library,**

**“I want to exist in the same place as you”. I love that. It feels very correct. Doing things with you would be nice. I could show you the castle and introduce you to friends and you could show me muggle games and movies. Those would be nice things, but most of all I just want to exist in the same place as you.**

**I don’t know if there’s hope for Reg and me. I want there to be. I wish for it and I think about it a lot and I hate that I think about it a lot. I want him to come to his senses and apologize and forgive me, but I can’t see it ever actually happening. He’s too far gone and I’m too far away. Too much has happened in my life. I still love him so much. I don’t think he feels that way about me and I don’t think he has for a long time.**

**I don’t know what to say about Greyback. ‘I’m sorry’ doesn’t cover it and ‘I want to hug you’ doesn’t cover it. I feel cold and sick. I don’t know what to say, but if you were here I would want to hold your hand.**

**I celebrate the celebration part of Christmas! It’s the second best holiday of my year. I’m even looking forward to being at Hogwarts through it this year. I’ve never been, I always had to go home. I hear not many people do stay, but some of the professors do. Speaking of Professors, I only got to hug like two, because everyone else took the handshake option. Very sad. But one of the two was McGonagall, of course, and that was lovely.**

**Yours,  
** **Sleeping On Beds**

**P.S. How do you go about hugging a ghost?**

**P.P.S. I haven’t kissed a lot of people, either, but that’s not what people say about me.**

**P.P.P.S. I am sending this letter in two parts, hopefully you read this one first, even though it was written second, because the other one is a bit abrasive, but, really, it was necessary. You’ll see.**

 

 

**Remus John Lovely,**

**November is the worst month of the year? NOVEMBER IS THE WORST MONTH OF THE YEAR?!**

**Remus. Remus. Be reasonable. November is, bar none, by a longshot, utterly, incomparably, irrevocably, the most important month of the year. November is the best. It is the essence of nature, it is the life of the leaves as they are ending. It is the bright, popping colours of October, muted with the subtlety of browns and frost. It is crisp air and warm fires and firm ground and the tease of snow in the air. November is everything.**

**Unrelated, November is also my birth-month. Host to the most important, single day of the entire year. Which happens to be: Today. November 3** **rd** **. Happy birthday to me.**

**I don’t take my birthday lightly. Let’s make that clear. This is MY day. I can’t skive off class, since it’s a school day, but James and Pete and I always have a personal party in the dorms on the following weekend. Just us and food and games and singing and, more recently, some illicit substances. It is MY day. Everyone knows this, everyone abides it. Nobody is allowed to treat me unkindly, everyone should enjoy themselves in my presence. Those are the rules.**

**Happy My Birthday!**

**Yours,  
** **Special On Birthday**

**P.S. I’m going to send another letter along with this one that’s actually a response to your letter. I got a bit carried away here. OPEN THAT ONE FIRST!**

  
  


_ Skittles Oreos Bounty, _

_ (those are all candies I’m sending you with this letter), I’m sorry!! I didn’t know it was your birthday, you didn’t tell me! Happy Birthday!! I wish you all the best and would just like to take this opportunity to tell you how very happy I am that I got you as a penpal and that we’ve gotten to be such good friends. I really, really, really, like talking to you. How you celebrate sounds great, hope the actual day was too, other than me insulting your birth month. How does it feel to be of age? _

_ I’m not sure if it’s possible to hug a ghost. The closest you can get to it I think is them floating through you while you stretch out your arms and then close them, like you’re trying to catch them. Maybe close your eyes and try to imagine warmth? Sorry I don’t have any better advice, I’ve only met a ghost once. _

_ You don’t have to say anything about Greyback. You holding my hand sounds very nice and comforting. _

_ I’m gonna go to town now to get you something for your birthday, I just wanted to send this ahead, so that you get my apologies and congratulations as soon as possible. _

_ I love you,  
_ _ Running Jumping Leaping _

_ P.S. Pumpkin soup is also on its way, via owl #98 aka Mildred. _

 

 

**Runes Justly Lying,**

**Thank you for the sweets! I could eat a thousand of the Bounty ones! I love those, now. The best birthday present was what you wrote in the last letter, though. About being glad that we’re pen pals. I am, too. I can’t believe I was ever disappointed to not have some other Beauxbatons person, and I REALLY can’t believe how incredibly rude to you I was about it. I’m so sorry I was ever the cause of bad feelings for you, I hope I never am that again. I want to bring you smiles and laughter and lots and lots of sweets, so I’m sending Mildred back with more chocolate crystal balls and pasties.**

**Being of age is strangely normal and the birthday itself was wonderful. There was a small party on the Quidditch pitch, since there was a practice last night for the Gryffindor team, so that’s where I wanted to be. The real party, the one I mentioned, is on Saturday. I’m looking forward to that. I always kind of hate the day after Sirius Day, because of that rule about nobody being mean to me on my birthday. It makes it rough the next day when everyone just treats me normally and I’m not – okay, this is going to sound awful and narcissistic, but I think I can tell you and you’ll hear it for what it is, not what it sounds like – when everyone just treats me normally and I’m not central, I’m not special, I’m not important simply for existing. Merlin, it is awful. Please don’t think less of me.**

**What ghost have you met? Did you ever hug them? I have now hugged twenty one ghosts and let me tell you, it’s not terribly pleasant. Cold in the way that hurts your bones, but I liked it anyway. Most of them never get hugs, I think.**

**Yours,  
** **Successful Owl Breeder**

**P.S. You don’t have to get me anything for m**

**P.P.S. You said you love me. I was looking over at your letter as a reference for writing this one and I just saw it. My eyes always skip to the silly name at the bottom, I missed it the first three times I read it. Did you mean that? Did you mean to write it? It doesn’t seem like an accident. You love me? You feel love for me?**

**P.P.P.S. I don’t really know why I crossed out the first postscript, it seemed unimportant in comparison. I almost crossed out the entire letter along with it.**

  
  


_ Seemingly Oval Ball, _

_ Yes, I meant to write that, it wasn't an accident. If these letters were verbal, it probably would be by accident, at some earlier point. But I'd still mean it. Yes, I do feel love for you. I love you. You're my best friend. _

_ And don't worry about our rough start, it's long forgotten and forgiven. Maybe think of that on not your birthday days, when you feel less special; you're the most special, you're the only one who got me, completely objectively speaking, the best possible penpal. You weren't excluded, you were too special for a normal one. _

_ I met a ghost when dad was doing some research and wanted to interview her, so he invited her over for dinner. For dinner. He invited a ghost. For dinner. We had to intentionally burn everything to give it stronger flavour so she could float through it and pretend to taste something. It hurt my soul. _

_ I wasn't sure what to get you, nothing seemed good enough. I didn't want to burden you with a book, I didn't want to give you a game I couldn't play with you, and I haven't asked you yet about what kind of music you like. I figured you don't know many muggle bands, so really anything would be a safe bet, but I don't know if you have any devices there that could play it. I know a lot of them wouldn't work because of magic, but a record player maybe could, does anyone have one? Anyway, I ended up getting you art supplies. You said you like to draw, so here's a few options of what you can do it with. I hope you like my gift. In case you don't, I also enclosed more Bountys. Not thousands, my budget wouldn't allow me that, neither would my conscience; I don't want to be responsible for your stomach pain. Or any other pain. _

_ Yours,  
_ _ Rocks of Jittery Love _

_ P.S. Thanks for the food. _

 

 

**Ririus Jrion Llack,**

**I love you, too! You’re my best friend, too! Thank you. I love saying that to my friends. I had a really hard time with that at first – saying it, I mean. James was the first person that ever told me that, and it felt amazing to hear, but very uncomfortable to try to say for the longest time. I say it every chance I get, now, though sometimes it’s still a little surreal. Objectively, I really do have the best pen pal. No contest.**

**That sounds dreadful. Does burning food really make it easier for ghosts to taste? Is that a real thing? I need more ghost friends.**

**Remus, I adore the art supplies. Nobody else got me anything nearly this thoughtful. I’ve already begun turning the entire dormitory into an art studio. James and Peter are thrilled, actually. They were painting each other’s faces when I went up after Divination earlier today.**

**With love,  
** **Semus Ohon Bupin**

**P.S. Thank you! For all the Bountys! These should last me until Christmas if I space them right.**

**P.P.S. Sorry, this feels short, I’m exhausted and tomorrow is a long day of partying.**

**P.P.P.S. Yes, a bunch of us have record players but I don’t know if they work with muggle records. I’ve never tried. James has one in our dorm that we all use.**

**P.P.P.P.S. I can’t stop laughing at “Bupin”, that is my new favourite name.**

 

 

_ Speedy Orange Boomerang, _

_ I'm so happy you like the gift. I kind of knew you would, but then the more time passed the more I felt like I have no idea if you'd like it or not. My birthday, thanks for asking, who's the rude one now, is March 10th, and I'd love a Sticky Odd Banana original. I can tell where your mind is going - don't paint me a sticky odd banana, now. _

_ I don't think ghosts can actually taste anything, no matter how burnt it is, but there hasn't been any research about it, and some of them apparently claim it does, so who knows. Would you want to come back as a ghost? I wouldn't, I don't think. Unless maybe everyone I knew and loved died before me and they became a ghost, and they'd want me to stick around as well. _

_ Hey, what's Divination class like? There's a lot of fake psychics in the muggle world, so it's always been a bit hard to imagine there actually being anything to it. How much magic is there actually involved in it? If it's just tea leaves reading, couldn't muggles do it just as well? I've heard about the Gift, but if they teach the subject to so many students, it can't be just about that. What does a Divination exam look like? Do you have to predict something and if it doesn't come true you fail? What if you predict something that's not going to happen for years? Can you cheat and just say you'll fall down the stairs and then throw yourself down the stairs? _

_ Exams are different here, at least in high school, we don't have one final exam at the end of the year, we have loads of them during the year, and then the average of them is your final grade. And then at the end of final year there's big exams for everything you've ever learned, it's called the General Certificate of Education Advanced Level. No cool initials like O.W.L.s or N.E.W.T.s, so we just call them A-levels. _

_ Hope the partying is / was successful! _

_ Lots of love, _

_ Rumours are Jealous Lies _

_ P.S. I laughed at Bupin for solid ten minutes. _

_ P.P.S. I'm imagining your party and now I'm imagining butterbeer and now I want butterbeer and how have I never used Butterbeer as your name and I'm calling dad to stop at the Leaky Cauldron and get me some on his way from work. _

_ P.P.P.S. Mum hates butterbeer, she's weird. _

 

 

 

**Respectable Jail Libido,**

**Whether I send it to you on March 10** **th** **or not, I WILL be painting you a Sticky Old Banana. That’s going to happen. I would love to make you something for your birthday. Why is it so far away? March is forever in penpal years. It’s already been three penpal years since September.**

**Are you accusing these ghosts of lying!? If they claim to taste burnt food, I believe them. I’m taking their word for it. Shame on you. I would love to come back as a ghost with all my friends, it would be like an eternal party. But not without them. Not only would it be incredibly lonely, which is the worst possible thing for me – I can’t stand being alone, but it would be scary I think. Eventually humans won’t be on this planet anymore, but ghosts still will? Forever? In eons, when all life is ended and there is nothing left on earth but dirt, will the ghosts still be wandering around? It’s too much. So no, I don’t think I want to come back as a ghost.**

**Divination is alright. A lot of it is theoretical, you can go through the entire class for four years and never “see” anything, but as long as you know what symbols mean what you’ll be alright. I use a lot of what I know from astronomy in it, particularly in the celestial units, and then you just apply the symbolism of divination to the actual paths of the planets and things like that. A lot of it is also learning how to induce “sight”, so last week we were learning which ingredients to blend to turn into incense and burn for clearing the mind and meditation.**

**Thank you for telling me about A-levels, I’m definitely going to need that for Muggle Studies. Why couldn’t they come up with cute acronyms for them? That’s sad.**

**Why does your mother hate butterbeer! That’s absurd. Butterbeer is delicious. We had so much of it at the party Jamie got sick. It was gross and wonderful. We ate and drank way too much and there was a singing competition, which ended when a scout from one of the other 6** **th** **year boys’ dorms was sent to tell us to shut up. It was great.**

**With love,  
** **Squishy Octopus Brat**

**P.S. I told you about divination, now you tell me about one of your weird muggle classes!**

  
  
  


_ Strangely Oily Banshee, _

_ I've told my parents that you're disappointed about when my birthday is, and they send their sincere apologies. _

_ I'm currently doing my physics homework, so I'm gonna tell you about that. It's the study of matter, so really of everything, and how it moves and otherwise behaves in space and time. It also includes some astronomy. Maybe I should've picked a different subject to describe, physics covers a lot of things. Like we learn about the planets, and we learn about gravity, and we learn how fast and with how much friction a trolley goes downhill. I quite like it, but it's not my favourite. I'd really like to know what my professor would say if he knew about magic, though. How good are you personally at divination? Could you predict my future? _

_ Listen. Listen. Mum is a strange, strange creature. Not only does she not like butterbeer, she also doesn't like pasta. Who doesn't like pasta?! And she eats onions like they're apples. Really, there's no understanding that woman. _

_ I'm glad your party was a success! What did you sing, what's your favourite song? Do you sing well? I'm thinking maybe not, if they had to shut you up. How many dorms are there per year? Were you assigned rooms or were you allowed to pick your own roommates _

_ With love,  
_ _ Ripe Juicy Lemon _

_ P.S. Pumpkin soup delivery coming via owl #56 aka Helen. _

_ P.P.S. I'm going to Diagon Alley this weekend, need anything? Or maybe something from muggle London? A tourist’s souvenir? A pebble? A fallen leaf? A stray cat? Let me know. _


	6. Chapter 6

**Right Just Lame,**

**Tell your parents I forgive them.**

**I feel very small right now. That’s the only way to describe this, I think. Physics is so big. I’m here learning what things to stick into a pot to turn into a little vial of something and you’re off in muggle school learning physics. The study of EVERYTHING. Space and matter and things and it’s so much. How do you learn all of it in a class? Why aren’t we learning it? Why am I taking Astronomy, which only covers the stars and planets while other people are learning everything?**

**I’m having a bit of a crisis.**

**I’m also having a crisis over your mother. The onion thing. Remus. Tell me you’re joking about the onion thing. Not liking butterbeer or pasta is weird. Very weird. But eating an onion like it’s an apple seems like it should be somehow against the rules. I don’t know what rules. This is all very upsetting to my mind.**

**How dare you?! I am an excellent singer! We ran through every BeWitches record we own, which, collectively, is 7. Two of them are alternate recordings of the same albums. And I don’t remember much of the singing as we were somewhat inebriated at that point. Maybe they weren’t entirely in the wrong when they told us to shut up.**

**There are three boys’ dorms in our year, three people to a room, but number of rooms and roommates varies based on how many people there are. I know that there are five Gryffindor dorms of four girls each and Ravenclaw boys have four rooms of four and one of three. In first year, you’re assigned rooms. We’re not sure whether it’s random or how dormmates are chosen. A popular theory is that the sorting hat chooses and tells McGonagall after the sorting ceremony. Anyway, first and second year you’re with those assigned people, and then third year there’s no names on the doors when you go up there after the Return Feast and you get to pick. I’ve never heard of anyone switching after that, but I suppose you could in following years.**

**With love,  
** **Sharp Oblivious Blade**

**P.S. Thank you for the soup! It was just as amazing as last time. And Helen is the sweetest bird I’ve ever met, your dad cannot have her back.**

**P.P.S. I definitely would love a muggle souvenir but I have no idea what that might consist of. You know me by now, use your judgement.**

**P.P.P.S. You leave those stray cats alone!**   
  
  


_ Soft Overprotective Bear, _

_ Don't have a crisis over physics, please, I know it sounds big and important, but most people forget everything they've learned about it in high school and live their lives completely normally.. I'd offer to send you my textbook so you could have a look, but I think it would just overwhelm you even more.  _

_ I'm completely serious about mum and onions. I'm enclosing a picture as evidence. That's dad in the background making a face that perfectly sums up my feelings about it.  _

_ That seems like a good system for dorm assignments. Now I can imagine I'd be rooming with you if I went, and that feels warm. _

_ Have to leave for London now, I'll try to find that cat for you, since you were so insistent on it, but I make no promises. _

_ Love you,  
_ _ Rushing Joints Late  _

_ P.S. Dad says you can’t keep Helen, sorry. _

 

**Realism Juxtaposed with Lunacy**

**A small, very masochistic part of me wants you to send me the physics book, anyway. I'm still not over it. I will never be over it.**

**I'll send this back with Helen if I really must return her, but tell your dad I'm smad about. That's mad and sad, smad. I'm not smad about the picture, though. I love this picture. She looks outrageous and he looks absurd and they look like best friends. Was it you who took the picture?**

**Warm is exactly how I'd describe imagining you living in our dorm. It would be perfect, you're going to adore Peter and James, and if we were all dormmates we'd all get along so well.**

**I hope you enjoyed London - and let all of the felines alone! Aren't you part wolf? Shouldn't you hate cats?**

**Love,  
** **Sangria Or Beer**

**P.S. Muggle photographs are so strange, I keep waiting for it to move and it just doesn't.**   
  
  


_ Synchronised Ornate Ballerinas, _

_ I’m back from London and I’m feeling like crap. After the muggle part, I went to get some pain potions, and also to exchange some books at the second-hand bookshop, and then dad was supposed to pick me up and apparate us back home, but he had to work late, and for some reason I thought it would be fun to take the train, just that it wasn’t fun, not even a little, not at all. The drive was long and my seat wasn’t comfortable and my compartment was full of people, and they kept talking and being loud, even though I was sitting in the “quiet area”. There was too much noise for me to sleep, and I felt too sick to read, not sure if it was from the moving, or from the upcoming moon, but it was bad, and it’s even worse now. Sorry for complaining, I just had to get it out. I’m sending Helen back with this and the thing I got you, so you can see her again. _

_ Yes, I took the picture. Most of the pictures we have are muggle ones, mum still gets a bit freaked out by the wizard ones, and thinks the moving ruins the “magic” of pictures a bit, like it doesn’t properly capture the moment, if the people in the picture can still kind of move on their own. I like both, and I quite enjoy taking them. They are best friends, I’m glad that’s been captured in the picture and is obvious to someone seeing them for the first time. _

_ No. I am not part wolf.  _

_ I’m gonna send Fa to you as well, with my old physics textbook, once I find it. I need mine to study, and also it’s probably better for you to start with the first year one that has more basic things in it and might not be so overwhelming.  _

_ I’m gonna go drink some herbal tea now and go to bed. _

_ Love,  
_ _ Rhyming Jaw Law _

_ P.S. I don’t hate cats, either. _

_ P.P.S. I’m sorry, this is just really bothering me. I’m a werewolf. Don’t deny that, can’t change that. But I only turn one day/night a month, and it’s only then that the wolf comes out and takes over and its instincts drive my body and take over my thoughts. One day. The other days I’m all me, I’m not part wolf, and I don’t share any thoughts or feelings or instincts or desires with it. I don’t like my meat on the rare side, I don’t want to chase after everything that moves, I don’t want to kill just because I’m bored, and I don’t hate squirrels, or rabbits, or weasels. Or cats. I don’t hate cats. _   
  


 

**Rinse Jars of Lotion,**

**I am sorry. I meant nothing harmful by the ‘part wolf comment’. Of course, I would never. But I appreciate you explaining it to me like you did. So you don’t identify with the wolf at all? It is not you, I know that, so you always refer to it as ‘it’? A separate entity entirely? Remus, I love you, and I need you to know I do not think of you in the context of the wolf when I think of you. I just want to understand this part of it. I don’t think you’d find it in any textbook on werewolves, no matter how progressive. You’re not an animagus, you’re a werewolf. It is very, very different. I call James part-deer and wormy part-rodent and myself part-dog because those things you said are true of me, I DO feel the need to chase things occasionally, and I DO like my meat on the rarer side of medium. But there’s a huge difference between what I am and what you are and I should have been more sensitive to that. I’m sorry. And I’m sorry it was upsetting to you in a moment when you were already feeling unwell.**

**This is too important, so I’m going to end the bulk of the letter here.**

**Love,  
** **Sorry Old Boy**

**P.S. Your parents look like the kind of best friends I would want to be best friends with. I hope it’s okay, I have the picture hanging up over my bed with all my other pictures of my friends. I like knowing that you took the picture, it feels like you’re there on the wall now.**

**P.P.S. Thank you for Helen! Other students are getting curious about why I always have a small flock of owls around me at a given moment. I like these rumors a lot more than the ones they’re usually spreading.**

**P.P.P.S. I’m going to sleep in the girls’ dorm again tonight. It’s going to be lovely.**

 

_ Sweet Olive Balm, _

_ I don’t identify with the wolf, no. I make jokes about it sometimes on good days, but nah. You were very right in saying that it’s nothing like being an animagus. I know some people think that werewolves are always monsters and that after becoming one it’s just your nature to be like that, and people like Greyback really aren’t doing our reputation any service, but it’s not true. I refer to the wolf as it, because that’s how it feels. When the moon comes out and I shift, I’m gone. Fighting it is meaningless, it always manages to take over, and I don’t remember the things that happened during the moon later. My bones break, and my skin gets scarred, but my mind isn’t there for that part, and it isn’t there when the moon isn’t. Obviously there’s still some things that affect me on other days, like I’m allergic to silver, for example. But nothing else. None of the bad things. Do you believe me? Even if the textbooks say differently? _

_ It’s okay that you have the picture on your wall. I’m sending you another one of the view from the window above my desk, so you can see what I see when I write to you. _

_ Hope your sleepover was fun, tell me all about it. _

_ I love you,  
_ _ River Jungle Lake _

_ P.S. How good are you at potions? Asking for a friend. _

_ P.P.S. You being surrounded by owls sounds awfully cute. _

 

**Raucous Jeering Laughs,**

**I’ll take your word over any textbook every time. I went looking for one and maybe there are some out there, but we don’t have any in the school library – have you ever seen a book about lycanthropy written by an actual werewolf? It’s a very necessary perspective, and yet I can find nothing. Even if there are books like that, I’d still take your word against it.**

**I love this picture, Remus. So much. You’re such a mess. Are those tea-stains set in the wood forever or would a lifting charm take them out? Don’t try, they’re wonderful. I like the way the light comes in, I like all your piles of books, I like that sad little plant that looks like it’s dying but also like it’s used to dying and it’s been dying for thirty years.**

**My sleepover was not fun. Well, the sleepover was. But then some things happened. I’m not ready to talk about them.**

**I love you, too,  
** **Still Only Boy**

**P.S. I’m alright at potions, nothing next to Lily, but I pull O’s on exams. Why?**

**P.P.S. I am absolutely awfully cute.**

**P.P.S. Okay. I think I’m ready. So the sleepover was great. I slept on another girl’s bed because she was sleeping elsewhere last night so she said I was welcome to it. We stayed up talking and talking and talking forever and it was so lovely. I tried on a bunch of Mary’s clothing because we’re about the same size, and it was amazing. Remus, I looked so cute. I felt so cute. And she looked so cute in mine. I wore her muggle clothes all night. I didn’t even think about it. And then I went to get my bag from the common room so we could do homework things together, and nobody was supposed to be awake, it was late, nobody is ever in the common room that late. But some people were, four of them, from 6** **th** **and 7** **th** **year and they saw me coming out of the girls’ dorm and th I tried t it was bad. It was really bad. I didn’t go to class today.**   
  


_ Sirius, _

_ Listen to me. I don’t know what those people said to you, but it clearly upset you, and you should take no note of it. Also, I am prepared to duel them all. At once, if I have to. You had fun, and you felt good in Mary’s clothes, and that’s all that matters. No one should take that away from you. Just because you wore clothes that belong to a girl, doesn’t mean you are a girl. Clothes have no gender. That being said, if you want to be a girl and feel like a girl, then you are a girl. Or you’re a boy and a girl, or you’re neither, or you’re something else entirely. There is a lot of genders, and you can be whichever one you want, or none at all. It’s up to you, and how you feel, and what you feel best describes you and is most comfortable to you. And whether that’s boy, girl, agender, genderqueer, genderfluid, demiboy, demigirl, whichever, it’s okay, and it’s only ever up to you, and no one can judge you for it or say anything about it. Because they don’t know what it’s like in your skin, only you do, and what they say doesn’t matter. Also, I will fight them. _

_ I’m sorry if this is a lot, but imagining what they said to you made me really angry and I felt you needed to hear all this. I love you. Letter responding to other things to follow. _

__ -Remus _ _

 

  
  


_ Snowflake Of Beauty, _

_ I hope you’re feeling a bit better by now. Have you told anyone else about this? I need someone to hug you for me, a lot. _

_ There is one book that’s supposedly written by a werewolf, called Hairy Snout, Human Heart, but I haven’t yet managed to obtain a copy, so I can’t vouch for it being any good. Though from what I’ve heard, it’s not so much about lycanthropy as it is about love and romance. _

_ I’m glad you like the picture, and consequently part of my living space; one of my favourite places in the house, actually. I’ve never even noticed the tea stains until you pointed them out. The plant’s name is Lola and I do forget to water it sometimes, but it always forgives me and never dies. We’ve been friends for quite some years, now; maybe not thirty, but three for sure. _

_ I asked about potions because like me, dad also sucks at them, and we could use some help. We’ve been trying to make some pain ones lately, to save on money, but it’s not been going well. We might have melted a cauldron last week. _

_ The moon’s tomorrow and I’m starting to feel all achy, so even if you reply before that, I doubt I’ll manage to send you back a letter for a couple of days. Just remember that I love you and lots of other people love you, and people who are mean to you are jerks. _

_ Hugs,  
_ _ Raging Jilted Lycan _

 

 

**Resistant Jungle Leopard,**

**Thank you. I want to tell you everything that happened that night but I can’t bring myself to write it down. I told James and Peter, of course, I’ve been getting a respectable amount of hugs. Still haven’t left the dorm though. James told all the teachers I’m ill, but they say the rumors are starting about why I’m really not coming to class and none of them are very kind. I don’t even care. I don’t know where the past two days went. I just lied in bed and thought about trying to read or do homework but never actually did anything. Listened to music for a bit, but how much time could that have taken? Mostly slept. It’s a weird feeling, heavy and foggy. Maybe I really am ill.**

**I’m sorry. I shouldn’t even send that. I can’t believe I’m complaining about not feeling right when you’ve got the moon coming up. Is there anything I can do to make that better for you? If Lily and I work together, we can definitely brew you up something nice for pain relief. Problem is it’s against school rules to brew potions outside the dungeons – that’s where potions classes are located – so either we’d need to get permission for extracurricular potion-making from Slughorn or we’ll have to do it on the sly. I like the sound of the second one better, but I’ll see what she thinks.**

**The problem is, it would be really easy for Lily Evans and Sirius Black to get extra time for potions from Slughorn, but the idea is nauseating. He fancies us both. Not in a creepy, pedophilic kind of way, but in a still-creepy, human trophy kind of way. Lily, potions star and me, a Black. He’s been trying to get both of us to go to his little parties for years, but we’ve both resisted up to this point. He does that. He has parties for his favourite students. Most professors deny it if they’re accused of favouritism, but not Sluggy. No, he hosts actual soirees for his favourites. It’s disgusting and slimy and I hate everything about it. I’m hoping Lily hates that idea as much as I do, but I’m not ruling it out.**

**Love,  
** **Serving Our Bowtruckles**

**P.S. if I buy you that book, will you read it for me and tell me if it’s worth all that?**

**P.P.S. Could you explain more about all the different genders? I only recognize a handful of those.**

 

_ Simple Ostrich Breakdancing, _

_ Don’t ever not tell me about your feelings just because you think mine might be worse. I survived the moon, like I’ve survived many before. And yeah, I’m in pain, but it doesn’t mean you’re not allowed to be. I’m sorry you are, though. I’m sorry you’re going through this, I know it’s anything but fun. Have you left the room yet? At least for a sneaky after-dark walk, maybe even as Padfoot? _

_ Gender is a bunch of crap. It’s not real, it’s completely made up, but let’s forget about that for a second, because that’s not something that will help you in this moment. Basically there’s a whole spectrum of gender, just like there is of sexuality, and it’s far from just the binary woman and man. I’ll enclose a chart of the most common ones / the ones I know. _

_ And like I’ve said in my previous letter, no one but you gets to say who or what you are. And it’s also okay if you don’t know, if you need time to figure it out, or if you change your mind on the way. It’s all fluid, if you “pick” something, it doesn’t mean you have to stick with it for forever; just as long as it feels okay today. _

_ I’d be forever grateful if you and Lily could whip something up for me, but not if it’s gonna get you into trouble, and most definitely not if it’s gonna mean that you’ll have to have anything to do with Slughorn, he sounds like the grossest person, I can’t believe someone can be like that. Parties? Really? Ew. Sounds disgustingly elitist. _

_ Gonna go rest / sleep some more now. Missed you. _

_ Lots of love,  
_ _ Ruined Joints Lying _

_ P.S. Yes, I’d read that book and tell you if it’s worth the read.  
_

_ P.P.S. Hello to all. _

_ P.P.P.S. All means your friends and just your friends. _

 

**Recalcitrant Judge of Lists,**

**I did like you said, I took a walk as Padfoot. It was good, I think. It felt good to be outside. Cold wind through fur actually feels really nice, so I didn’t mind the weather. I went to Transfiguration this morning, but I’m supposed to be in Defense now, but instead I’m back up in the dorm.**

**Lily is coming up here tonight with potions ingredients and we’re going to start some things for you. The good, strong stuff should be ready before the next moon. We’ll try little quick ones so that you have them through the month, but they’ll be weaker than I’d like. I’m very ambitious about it, Lily is trying to keep me in check. Jamie says he’d like to help, too, he’s good at potions. Only he and Lils don’t get along so well. Long story. I’m just glad she hated the idea of kissing up to Slughorn even more than I did – she wouldn’t hear of it. She likes him as a teacher, but she can’t stand that part of him. I can’t stand any of it.**

**I tore the chart out of your note and hung it up on the wall. A few of them resonate but also it’s all a bit scary, still. I need time to get comfortable with them, I think.**

**There’s a big party thing happening – not Slughorn’s, the entire school’s – for Yule in a month or so. Before holiday, I think. Everyone from all the schools is coming. Like, everyone who’s got a penpal at Hogwarts. Some of the schools are host schools and some are visitor schools and we’re a host school. And everyone will get to meet their penpals. This is where that lonely, left out of the thick of things feeling comes back to bite me in the arse. I know they’re meeting them for one week and that’s it and the program is over and they’ll all probably never talk again, while you and I will meet someday later and we’ll stay friends forever, but I’m still envious. We will, right? Stay friends forever? Anyway, everyone is so excited, it’s all anyone is talking about and it’s not helpful that I’m already in a shite mood these last few days.**

**Love,  
** **Sea Oysters Bobbing**

**P.S. There’s a copy of that book coming for you in the mail. Not from here, I sent away for it. Make sure you name the delivery owl. Obviously.**

**P.P.S. Lily sends hugs, James sends a kiss, Pete sends a fist bump. They all say hi.**

  
  


_ String Of Bluebells, _

_ I’m glad the walk helped a little. You said you feel like chasing squirrels sometimes, do you also like it when people throw you sticks? Do you chase your own tail? Are you scared of thunderstorms? Do you get fleas? Would eating too much chocolate kill you? _

_ I understand it being scary, that’s totally normal. I’m always here to talk about it. _

_ If it makes you feel any better, I feel left out too; we can be left out together. Try not to think about that part too much and focus on how it’s still going to be really fun and cool, meeting all those people from different schools, so many potential new friends, or quick fun short lasting acquaintances. And yes. We will stay friends forever, no doubt about it. _

_ Thank you so much for trying with the potions. And if it doesn’t work, don’t feel bad about it, I’ll manage. Tell me that long James Lily story when you’ll feel like it. You’re such good friends with both of them, it’s a bit hard to imagine they wouldn’t get along. _

_ Lots of love,  
_ _ Regular Jatropha Leaf _

_ P.S. Now I can’t stop thinking about your friends not getting along with me. You seem to like me okay, but what if they don’t? _

  
  


**Radish Juice Lollipop,**

**My friends not liking you is not a thing you ever have to worry about. Lily and James don’t get along for a very specific reason. James is a good person. He’s possibly the best person I know. His heart is good and he gets more personal pleasure from helping others than from doing anything else for himself. He is kind and safe and warm. But when he was formative all of this translated to a child who was a bit too sure of himself, too invincible, too confident. He’s always had a crush on Lily, always. Since first year, I think, before any of us could recognize what a crush was. And Lily was never into him like that. He never harassed her or anything, but he was a bit overzealous at times. He did lots of stuff to try to impress her and get her attention, but none of it ever worked. And she tried, sometimes she tried to talk to him like a person, but he had her on this pedestal and couldn’t take her down from it, so she never got to see the human side of him, just the side that had a deep, deep crush on her, and that side was a prat. He’s mellowed out, now, he still likes her and I think he always will, but he’s accepted that he ruined any chance of having a decent friendship with her years ago, and now he leaves her alone. But they still don’t talk much. It doesn’t help, either, that she used to be friends with Snivellous, with whom James was always fighting when we were younger.**

**I love to fetch. I hate leads. I like drinking rainwater from leaves. I like scratches behind my ear and on my tummy. I don’t get fleas, but I do sometimes smell fur in my hair and I hate that a little bit. Does anybody really like thunderstorms??? I like lying in my friends’ laps and being cuddled. There’s a lot of overlay between what I like and what Padfoot likes. Lots of chocolate makes me sick very quickly if I eat it with a dog’s digestive system, and less quickly but just as sick as a human, but that’s more to do with the intestinal issues I told you about.**

**I like that way of looking at it – that I don’t have one penpal to catch up with, I have a thousand new acquaintances to make. And that you and I can be bitter and left out together. I definitely don’t mind being stuck in any situation that puts me with you.**

**I love you,  
** **Stirring Our Brew**

**P.S. Lily and I have been working for the last hour and it’s a lot of fun, so far! We took a break for homework and writing to penpals, and we’ll be back at it in a few minutes.**

  
  


_ Smell Of Biscuits, _

_ I just cannot get over how cute you sound in that dog paragraph. Makes me want to scratch you behind your ears. I love thunderstorms, they make me feel a strange mix of small and unimportant and calm and amazed by the world. I love just lying in a warm bed listening to it. And then the slow, big raindrops on my windowsill that eventually turns into a downpour to which I fall asleep.  _

_ I got the book today, via Mathilda. I haven’t opened it yet. I’ve been planning to read this book for years, and now that it’s here, I can’t bring myself to do it. What if it’s bad? Like, really bad? And then I’ll know for sure that really all, absolutely all, books about werewolves are bad and wrongly represented. I don’t want to lose that hope that maybe it’s good. I think I’m just gonna leave it on my bedside table for a few more days. _

_ I hope Lily and James can manage to become friends eventually. It seems like a waste of a good potential friendship. _

_ I was just thinking earlier when reading your letter about how I used to have problems at the start reading your fancy handwriting, like I would have to really focus on the letter, and often reread a word because it didn’t make sense at first, and now it’s just the most legible handwriting, I got to know it so well. And I really like that. _

_ With love,  
_ _ Rationally Jealous Lion _

_ P.S. I’ve been thinking. And as much as I also wouldn’t mind being stuck in any kind of situation with you, I don’t want to be in this one. I don’t want to be bitter. I don’t want to sit at home and read letters about how much fun you’re having, describing all the new people you’re meeting, and maybe being a bit sad I’m not there. Why shouldn’t I be there? I’m a part of the project just like everyone else and this is bullshite. I’’m writing to McGonagall, I want in on this. _

_ P.P.S. If that’s okay with you, of course. I’ll wait for your reply before writing to her. Just in case you’ve changed your mind about wanting to see me, or think it will still be too soon. I’m ready. _


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part of the text in this chapter is a picture, if for whatever reason you can't see it or are using text to speech, it's written out in the end notes.

**My Remus,**

**What exactly are you going to write to McG, I need to know so I can back you up and develop my own set of cunning arguments to get her to agree to fight Dumbledore on it and let you come.**

**Yours,  
** **Sirius**

_  
S-_

_Already wrote it just in case, enclosing it with this. Read it and if it’s okay, give it to her. My heart skipped a beat when you called me yours. For some reason I was too nervous to call you mine, and I don’t have time to overanalyze and potentially fix it, mum’s pushing me out the door as I write this, family night out._  
  
_\- Your Remus_

 

**Reliving June Lakesides,**

**It's perfect. I've requested to have a chat with her tomorrow, which I've been meaning to do for awhile, it's been a little over a week now, and I'll give it to her and talk to her then. Okay plan?**

**Your description of thunderstorms sounds so relaxing and lovely. I wish they were like that for me. I can’t be near windows when one is happening. If I can see the flash, I get scared. It’s just the bright, bright flash, like the light from a hex or a curse and then just waiting, waiting, waiting for the noise and even when I know it’s coming, it’s the anticipation and then the loudness – it’s just all very not good for me.**

**Take your time with the book. If it sits on your shelf forever as a symbol of potential then that’s the purpose it’s serving and it was well worth it. How does the cover look, is it nice? Nice enough for your bedside table?**

**I hope so, too, but my expectations are not high. Higher than they were, though, because last night was actually really pleasant. Lily and I worked while James was at quidditch, and then he came back up to the dorm and cleaned up and helped us out a bit, since we did start three all at once. And we all talked and it was nice. They didn’t say much directly to each other, but she didn’t seem uncomfortable and he wasn’t being an arse, so I’d call it progress.**

**I had the same problem at first with your handwriting, but I’ve gotten so used to your rhythms, I totally forgot that it used to be difficult to decipher what you were saying.**

**Love,  
** **Shining Over Britain**

**P.S. I’m ready. As the note sent previously may have suggested. Sorry but not sorry about that, by the way. I was too excited to wait to send a whole letter.**

 

_Summer Of Bliss,_

_Okay plan. Let me know how it goes immediately._

_I’m sorry thunderstorms are like that for you, that sounds like no fun at all. Hope James lets you hide in his lap when they happen._

_Thank you for being so understanding about the book. The cover does look quite nice, it’s brown and simple, nothing flashy like those “romance” novels, and no scary picture of a monster either._

_I’m glad you didn’t wait, I loved getting that fast little letter, and I like the image of you being too excited to wait._

_The family night out consisted of going to dinner and to see a play at the theatre. We all really enjoy that, but we don’t go a lot, just for special occasions; this one was dad’s birthday, which is in a few days. It was really nice, though to be honest I couldn’t stop thinking about you and Hogwarts the entire evening._

_Lots of love,  
_ _Risotto Jam Lamb_

_P.S. It just started to snow here. What’s winter like there? I imagine it’s super cold in the castle. Do you like snow? What’s your favourite season?_

 

**Reformed Juvenile Larcenist,**

**I thought maybe yelling out my excitement would make it easier to write a coherent letter to you, but I was so, so wrong. I’m still shaking with the euphoria of it. I can’t believe it’s a whole month away, now. I’m ready. McG says that if you agree to come then we’ll need to discuss living arrangements, because all the other schools are providing their own accommodations. It’s not a matter of not having room for you in a giant castle, it’s more a matter of what would be most appropriate. I told her you can have my bed and I’ll sleep on the sofa in the common room, but she didn’t seem to fancy that idea.**

**James is always really good about my thunderstorm issues, like we’re both really good about Pete’s skittishness. He had to drop Care of Magical Creatures mysteriously, because every time they brought out so much as a new kneazle he nearly fainted. I have really good friends. You’re included in that.**

**The cover of the book sounds promising. If that’s as far as you ever get, then it’s not a bad place to be, from the sounds of it.**

**What was the play about? I’d like to see what muggles do for plays. Lily says they’re nothing like the wizard equivalent. She says it’s not just one or two muggles, it’s often a whole lot of them, and that there’s singing and dancing and costumes. She says what we have is more like “dramatic readings”. I want to be in a muggle play as much as I want to see one. They sound like amazing fun from all angles.**

**Lily and I sent off the first batch of potions before the howler, but she was also sending some to her parents, so it might take a while to get there, I’m sorry. I think her owl probably went to Cokeworth first because it’s used to making that trip. Anyway, I hope those are sufficient enough for now. The stronger one is in a rather smelly phase, right now. We’re all going to try dorming elsewhere tonight. I’m going to be brave and go back to Lily’s room and not let what happened last time ruin how good that was. And will be.**

**Love,  
** **Studied Occlumency, Boring**

**P.S. Winter in the castle is lovely, when you stop and appreciate it. Cold, definitely, but there’s warming charms over all the doors to every room, and all the fires are lit and stay lit until about April. I love snow on the grounds. I love snow. I love rolling around in snow and I love when my body heat makes it melt into my hair and it’s like I’ve been swimming in it. Snowball fights and little snow houses and snow-ghosts. I love all of it. I love winter. It’s when I shine my brightest, of course.**

 

_Snowy Outstanding Best (friend),_  
_  
I get to choose. I choose yes. My decision is yes. My choice is yes. Yes, I am coming to Hogwarts to meet you. Sure, the whole childhood dream thing is kind of coming true in part, but nah, this is mostly about you now. I can’t wait to see you and hug you, and hear that amazingly beautiful voice of yours in person. I loved getting excitedly yelled at by you, I’ve never gotten a howler before. I can imagine them being quite scary, if the person is mad at you, but this was nothing but a great experience for me._

_I’m not as big of a fan of winter as you are. I like watching big flakes of snow falling outside, from the comfort of my warm bed, with hot cocoa in my hands, but being outside in it is not one of my favourite activities. I get a cold in like, three seconds, and then it lasts the whole winter, and it’s not fun. That being said, I would totally have a snowball fight with you, and win. Yes, this is a challenge._

_I’m consistently more and more jealous of you and your friends. You seem like such a tight group, and like you have each other’s backs no matter what, and that is amazing, and I want it._

_The play was about a king, and a ghost, and death, and justice. I think you’d like it. It’s pretty long, but it was a more modern adaptation, and I think it would keep you interested. If you get that excited about just hearing Lily describe muggle plays, I’m definitely taking you to one. Preferably a musical, you’ll love that. Or you can take me, because the tickets are expensive, and I’m broke. A casual unconnected reminder, my birthday is March 10th._

_It’s okay if the potions don’t get here soon, I’m feeling alright at the moment and there’s still plenty of time til the next m_ _  
_ _Sirius. Sirius, when exactly is that week gonna happen? Do you know yet, the exact dates? I’m freaking out and maybe crying._

 _Hugs,  
_ _Rotating Juicy Liquid_

_P.S. If it happens, I don’t care where I sleep. My first choice is your bed, but I’ll stay outside in an igloo if I have to, cold be damned.  Just please please Merlin please don’t let it fall on the 18th._

 

**RemusiscomingtoHogwarts JohniscomingtoHogwarts LupiniscomingtoHogwarts,**

**Okay, here’s the thing. It falls a little bit on the 18** **th** **, but that’s not going to stop us, okay? It’s the 16** **th** **to the 23** **rd** **. That gives us two days of Remus feeling very ill and one of Remus not being here at all, right? Okay. So we have options. Option 1: you don’t come. I hate this option. This option sucks unicorn blood. Let’s not do option 1. Option 2: You come for half the week. When you’re feeling okay enough to do so after the moon. Would that be the 19** **th** **or the 20** **th** **? Remus, I don’t care if you’re here for a quick lunch on the 23** **rd** **as everyone is leaving, if you choose ‘yes’, you’re coming to Hogwarts. It’s going to happen. Option 3: We let the murder tree fulfill its purpose. Not as a murderer, but as your protector, like it was always meant to be. I like this option the best but I feel like maybe you’re not going to be completely comfortable with it. Talk to me. We’ll talk. We’ll work this out together, and whatever we decide, that’s the proposal we’ll bring to McGonagall.**

**I’m going to snowball fight you, Remus Jellylegs Lupin, and I’m going to win. It usually snows before Christmas at the castle, there’s a good chance this defeat is going to come to you sooner rather than later. Don’t think I won’t snowball fight a boy recovering from werewolf scratches, because I will.**

**I have the absolute best friends and you are right to be envious. Everyone should be. But also, you don’t have to be envious because you’re on the inside – you are the friends. You want this level of trust and closeness? Come here and get it, it’s yours. James and Peter could write essays on you, I talk about you so much. Lily brings you up in conversations to ask me what I think your opinion might be on whatever we’re talking about. Marlene smiles whenever I mention you. Smiles. My friends are already your friends, Remus, you just have to come meet them.**

**The play sounds hilarious. A king and a ghost? What kinds of shenanigans do those two get up to in this play? We will definitely see a play together. I’ll be in school on your birthday, though, so maybe over Easter hols? Do you celebrate Easter? Do you celebrate Christmas? What is your favourite holiday?**

**With a lot of love,  
** **Screaming of Banshees**

**P.S. Really, Remus. We’re going to figure this out. I promise.**

 

_Sauce Over Broccoli,_

_I hate option 1. I refuse to go with option 1. Option 3 sounds scary. I’ve talked to dad about it, and he thinks it could happen. He’s going to set up a meeting with McGonagall and Madam Pomfrey sometime by the end of the week, and figure out the logistics. I still might go with option 2, though. Sorry._

_I don’t quite feel yet that I’m on the inside with your friends, I hope that changes when I meet them in person. You will go down in that snowball fight so hard everyone’s gonna start calling you the falling star. Just ask my good friend Marlene, I bet she’d put her money on me._

_I do celebrate Easter, and Christmas, but also Hannukah, and that one is my favourite. It lasts 8 days and I get to eat latkes and sufganiyot all the time, it’s the best. What’s yours? I’m gonna take a wild guess and say Halloween._

_I got the potions, thank you. Lily’s owl was super kind and very pretty. We’ll see if I’ll be bringing some of the potions back with me to Hogwarts and using them there._

_I love you,  
_ _Real Jewish Latkes_

_P.S. About the book. Do you think if I brought it with me, I could try reading it in your dorm, with you close? A small part of it is cuddles, and the big is that if it sucks I can return it to you right away (and you can burn it)._

   
**Ragged Jovial Lark,**

**As long as it’s not Option 1, I’m fully supportive of it! I guess talking to McG first is the technically good idea, but it is still the lame one. Let your dad know I think it was a lame decision.**

**It’s okay that you don’t feel like you’re on the inside with my friends yet. It’ll be different once you’ve talked to all of them yourself, I know it will. You fit into my life too well to not slide right into place in our group just as easily. Marlene has taken to calling you her only friend. I told her I was offended by this, she told me she doesn’t care, you’re the only one that’s always been there for her.**

**I know a bunch of kids here that celebrate Hanukkah, but I’ve never witnessed it myself. What is it like? What are those things you mentioned, the foods? My favourite holiday absolutely is Halloween, you are correct, second only to My Birthday, which is of course a national holiday.**

**Yes, definitely, you should definitely bring the book with you when you come! And then do with it whatever you’d like.**

**Love,  
** **Show’s Over, Babe**

**P.S. You don’t need to bring potions back with you, you can keep those for the following month. We have a small stockpile here ready for you.**

 

_Sonnet On Brick,_

_My dad says he was gonna come say hi to you when he's there and deliver some pumpkin soup, but now that you think he's lame, he won't._

_I feel the same about Marlene, she's my favourite and clearly the coolest of you lot._

_You’re going to see Hanukkah for yourself, this year. I’m bringing it to you. It falls from the 12th to the 20th of December this year, so as long as I’m there by the 20th, which I am going to make sure I am, I’ll celebrate at least one night with you. I think you’re going to like it. There’s pretty candles and storytelling and gifts that are supposed to be money, but mostly we exchange actual gifts because it’s more fun, and so much fried food. I mean it, it’s a requirement that the food be greasy and fried and delicious to symbolize the oil that lasted eight nights. It’ll make sense when I tell the stories. Well, I suppose we won’t be preparing our own food while I’m there, so you’ll have to try latkes and sufganiyot another time. That’s okay, I’ll describe them in great detail for you while we’re celebrating._

_In other news, I have something very sad to tell you. In its fourth year of age, my perfect plant buddy Lola passed away. It looked like it was dying again, and then I watered it, and I think I overdid it a bit this time. It's very sad, but mum says she's gonna get me a new one. You get the honour of naming it._

_Lots of love,  
_ _Ruined Jasmine Leaves_

_P.S. Thank you for the unexpected chocolate cauldrons!_

 

**Ramifications for Juggling Lions,**

**I take it back, tell him I take it back, I want to meet your dad! This is important to me!**

**You and Marlene are both very rude, you’re going to get along horribly well, I feel left out already. But not in the bad way, in the happy, proud way.**

**I can’t wait to celebrate Hanukkah with you! Are you sure I’m allowed to? It wouldn’t be inappropriate given that I’m not Jewish? I much prefer giving gifts to money. Gifts are personal and meaningful and take time and thought. Money is gross. I’m sure we can work something out with the house-elves in the kitchens, as for the foods. I know they’re not opposed to cooking religiously important foods for the students who require it. Jamie and Pete and I will talk to them next time we’re down there.**

**I’m so sorry about Lola. I mean, they’re definitely in a better place now, they looked like they were in physical pain. But it’s sad, I’m sorry you’re losing such an old friend. What kind of plant do you think you’ll get next? Another muggle one? I will of course be honoured to name them, but I’ll have to at least see them first, if not meet them.**

**Yours,  
** **Such Ornate Baubles**

**P.S. You’re welcome! I like sending you things, sending just a letter too many times in a row feels so empty now.**

 

_Smitten Over Bakeries,_  
_  
Dad’s gonna come there on Friday, and will probably stay for dinner. You’ll be able to spot him easily, he’ll be the nerd sitting at the Ravenclaw table either chatting with people like they’re his classmates he sees every day, or fighting with someone over some nonsense only Ravenclaws care about. He’s looking forward to meeting you._

_Yes, I’m sure you can celebrate Hannukah with me. Could you maybe ask the house elves if we can just borrow their kitchens and make the food ourselves? I know they’re amazing cooks, but my mum has this amazing recipe, and she just taught me how to make latkes last year, and I wanna make those specific ones. Also show off in front of you. You’ll see, you’ll be soooo impressed with me._

_Sirius. This is really happening. I’m going to see you. And all of your friends. It’s real and I can’t stop thinking about it and I can’t wait for it to happen. I’m literally counting the days. I already talked to all of my professors at the muggle school, telling them I’ll be going on a trip and will be missing a week, and they all promised to tell me before what they’ll be covering and give me the assignments to do in advance. There shouldn’t be a lot anyway, no one really works hard just before Christmas break. You’re spending yours at Hogwarts, right?_

_What does Marlene like? I’m making these little gifts for all your friends, and I managed to come up with appropriate things for everyone from what you’ve told me about them, but not Marlene. Also you mentioned a Mary once? Is she a closer friend, too?_

_Lots of love,  
_ _Rambling Just a Little_

_P.S. Not only did I get a new plant, I got two! I was thinking maybe Lola died because it was so lonely. Here’s a picture of them, yes, you do get to name both of them. But I do have veto power._

_P.P.S. No, I’m not telling you what the gift for you is, save your ink and don’t even ask._

 

**Round Jiggly Lumps,**

**You wasted your ink telling me not to waste my ink. What are you making me?! Okay, if you can’t tell me what you’re making me, can you tell me what you’re making the others? Marlene is a mystery. She likes lots of things, but she won’t admit to liking any of them. I don’t think it’s a matter of her trying to look too cool for things, it’s more that she thinks if she says she likes it now, she’ll stop liking it tomorrow. Good luck with your gift for her, we’re all always lost on what to get her, welcome to the club.**

**The elves are so nervous about us using their kitchen, but we’ve assured them we’ll be most careful and clean up our own mess and everything, and that seemed to upset them more. Whatever else, we’ve secured use of the kitchens for proper latke making! I’ve never cooked before, is it easy?**

**Yes! I’m staying here for Christmas to spend the holiday with my darling Minnie. I’m also counting the days, we have it marked on our calendar in the dorm.**

**I love your new plants! The tall, leafy one is Flourish and the little one with the buds on it is Blott. Will those buds be flowers? What colour will they be?**

**Much love,  
** **Seven Ostrich Beaks**

**P.S. Tell your dad I’ll see him tomorrow!**

 

_Sponge On a Bench,_

_Dad just got home and he refuses to tell me anything about meeting you other than that you seem like a good person, says you should tell me instead. It might be that he’s really tired. Did he tell you about the meeting? McGonagall said yes to everything, and Madam Pomfrey agreed to help. So now it really is just up to me._

_Nope, I’m not telling you what I’m making the others either, it’s all a secret. I’ll figure Marlene out, she’s my best friend, after all. You didn’t answer about Mary?_

_Thank you for convincing the house elves for me! What are they like? Not just the Hogwarts ones, but in general. It seems very wrong to me that they just...work for wizards in exchange for nothing. I’ve never met one, and it’s hard to believe what I’ve been told, that they “want it to be like that”. Oh and no, cooking is not easy, at least not in my experience, but it is fun. Though you are good at potions, so maybe you’ll be naturally good at cooking too._

_Those are amazing plant names, I accept them. Yes, Blott is gonna bloom, but I don’t know which colour. They had a bunch of them at the shop, and they all had colours written on the little labels that were stuck in the pots, but not this one. That’s why I picked it, I want to be surprised by it. I’ll let you know when it opens up._

_Meeting you is so close I can feel it._

_Love,  
_ _Rattling and Jangling Loudly_

_P.S. I might have been a bit nervous about you meeting my dad, so I distracted myself with baking. Have them with milk, they’re a bit dry._

 

**Ridiculous Jigsaw Labyrinth,**

**Remus, you have the most amazing dad. Like, the most amazing. We had dinner together and we took a walk around to see some of his old favourite spots. He “showed” me a secret alcove near the entrance to Ravenclaw Tower that I toootally didn’t know was there. He was so excited but in a really calm, composed kind of way, it was very cute. I’m feeling kind of worried that he didn’t want to talk about me to you. This was my chance to make a good impression and I didn’t think I did poorly, but now I’m thinking I may have.**

**Mary! Mary is sunshine. She likes music, she has a non-magical guitar here that works because it doesn’t need to be plugged into an energy thingy, so she plays for us sometimes and sometimes we can hear her practicing because she’s just shite at silencing charms.**

**House elves are a strange lot. They seem to genuinely like the work, and the ones here are really good company, once you get to know them. They don’t like James as much because the first time we met them he tried to tell them they should leave and be free – like I said, they seem to want to be here. But as long as you don’t suggest they quit working, they’re very friendly. We chat while they cook sometimes. There’s this one, Shiny, and she collects secrets. She’s a font of gossip, but useless at giving it away properly because she doesn’t actually know anyone by name. The house elf I had growing up was called Kreacher. I like house elves. He is the exception. He adores my mother. Above and beyond the level of servitude I think is normal for elves. Disgusting.**

**I can’t wait to see what colours Blott blooms. I bet you it’s more than one colour. And I bet you one of those colours is yellow. I don’t actually have any money, but if I did, I would place money on this bet.**

**I had them with tea. James dunked his into the tea. I felt nauseous watching it. Pete tried it and said it wasn’t bad. I’m breaking up with both of them.**

**Love,  
** **Saggy Oval Biped**

**P.S. I just hope I’m not so bad at cooking that I ruin your traditional dinner.**

**P.P.S. Meeting you is so soon I can’t sleep.**

 

_Skull Over Brains,_

_No no no, it wasn’t anything like that, I promise! I told him what you’ve told me about it, and he says you’re very lovely and charming, especially when you relax a bit, apparently you were a bit too official and polite at the start. I don’t think he really had any doubts about it before, but he said again how you’re nothing like your ‘family’, and was amazed that you managed to become who you are despite what they’re like. He also didn’t suspect at all that you knew about the alcove._

_Mary sounds absolutely adorable, can’t wait to meet her too, she’s definitely also getting a thingy. I’ve been talking so much about them that I’m afraid you’re expecting something intricate and amazing, but it’s really nothing big or special, don’t get your hopes up._

_It won’t matter if you’ll be bad at cooking, I’m not great either, but I’m pretty confident in my skills for this particular recipe, so I think we’ll be fine. And anyway, we’ll definitely have fun, and that’s the more important part of cooking._

_So soon. So soon so soon so soon. And I still haven’t made up my mind. Do you really think it would be okay for me to spend the moon there? What if it won’t be safe enough, what if I hurt someone? And I’ll be useless to you the whole next day, I’ll just be lying in bed, probably the infirmary according to dad, all day long. I don’t know. Help._

_Love,  
_ _Reckless Jerk Losing (it)_

_P.S. I see you, Sirius. Stop worrying. I promise you made a good first impression._

 

**Realizing Jinxes Linger,**

**The thing your dad said about me not being like my family means more to me than I can convey in a letter. Thank you. Thank him for me? I’m going to try really hard, but there’s no way I’ll be able to just NOT worry about his opinion of me. I’m always worried about all opinions of me. It’s why I pretend not to care what other people think at all.**

**Mary is, in fact, very adorable. She’s almost as cute in her own clothes as I am. That’s high praise. She’s very excited that you’re including her. I believe Kingsley and Amelia are also getting you something small for Hanukkah/Christmas, just a heads up. They don’t expect anything in return, that’s not why I’m warning you. Moreso I’m warning you that other people are also anxious to meet you. I may talk about you sort of a lot to anyone who will listen.**

**Okay. So. Tell me things I can’t trust from textbooks. Will the wolf try to escape the shack? Is it dangerous to unsuspecting people, or just people that want to hurt it? Is it dangerous to animals like it’s dangerous to humans? Will you be uncomfortable recuperating in a new place?**

**Love,  
** **Shelter Okay Beasts**

**P.S. You never have to answer any question that makes you uncomfortable. Not that I asked any in this letter, at least I think I didn’t – but as a general rule. It’s important to me that you know that.**

 

_Speeding Over Bath,_

_I’ve been thinking about flying lately. I don’t remember if I’ve mentioned this when we were talking about quidditch, but I think I didn’t - I don’t know how to fly. I’ve never done it, I’ve never rode a broom before. Dad gets sick on them so he doesn’t have one, so there was never an option for me to try it. Do you think I could at Hogwarts? Do you have a broom? Are there school ones I could borrow? I really really want to try it, but I’m also really really scared and still half think everyone’s making this flying thing up and it’s not actually real._

_Tell me about Kingsley and Amelia, you’ve never mentioned them before?_

_Yes, the wolf will probably want to escape the shack, it hates being stuck somewhere inside, that’s why it takes it out on me. But if the charms will be properly put on it, there’s no way it can get out. I’m dangerous to everyone. Animals are safe other than when I can’t keep my food down and it’s hungry and wants to eat, but that rarely happens. I don’t mind recovering in a new place, not if you’re there._

_I know that I never have to answer anything I don’t want to, and the same goes for you. And if you ever do ask anything like that, I won’t. But I don’t think that’s going to happen, I feel like I could tell you anything._

_Best regards to my best friend, with love,  
_ _Reading Jocund Letters_

_P.S. Wow. Only a bit over a week now. Wow wow wow wow I can’t wait._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We thought the howler wouldn't read quite as nicely in plain small text, hence the screenshots of the original; here's the text for anyone who needs it: “Remus, she said yes, she said yes, she said yes, she said yes! She said we don’t even need to approach Dumbledore with it, that I think I have the authority to determine whether one sixteen year old guest may attend a school event, thank you very much! You’re coming here, you’re coming to Hogwarts! As long as you’re still okay with it, I mean, you could always change your mind, this is a big deal for you, much bigger than just meeting me, this is something you’ve dreamed about since you were a little boy. Even if you decide not to come, I promise there will be no hard feelings over it, I know it has to do with the larger picture, not with me personally and that your comfort is, of course, most important, but if you decide, if you decide, if you decide! Remus! If you decide to come then it is your decision to come! You get to say whether you come here or not, now, this is your choice! Remus, I’m so happy, no matter what else happens! Okay, I’m going to go write you an actual non-howler letter, now, okay, love you, bye!”


	8. Chapter 8

**Rhubarb Jelly Label,**

**You are absolutely going to learn how to fly. There are school brooms, yes, but they’re shite. You’ll use either mine or James’s. James’s is better, mine is a few years old. He gets a new one every summer when they release the newest model. I’m so excited to do this with you.**

**Kingsley is a Ravenclaw and Amelia is a Hufflepuff, but it’s common knowledge that when Amelia sat on the stool and put the hat on to be sorted, she sat there for fifteen minutes while it had a crisis because she fits well into every house. So eventually it gave up and asked her where she’d like to be and she said Hufflepuff out loud – announced her own sorting. It was wild. Anyway, they’re both lovely, you’ll meet them both next week. They’re in our year, I have classes with both of them, though I don’t quite know what you’ll be doing while I’m in class yet. I don’t know what any of the foreign students are going to do during those hours.**

**Okay, so hear me out and don’t say ‘no’ before you do. What if you just so happened to be best friends with a couple of really big animals, like a great big dog and a stag who could keep watch over the shack while you transform and make sure nothing bad happens?**

**I feel like I could tell you anything, too. I know I can.**

**Love,  
** **Saturn Orbits Bunnies**

**P.S. I know you’re going to be here in a week to try them fresh, but have some pasties for now anyway.**

 

_Smiling Or Burping,_

_I'm writing this at 4.26am. I've been up all night going through all the books dad has both on werewolves and animagi, and the final conclusion, confirmed many times, is that werewolves aren't dangerous to humans in the animagi form. It can't tell that they're humans so it doesn't want to bite them, and if something went terribly wrong and I would bite you, if you're in animal forms, you wouldn't become werewolves. So I guess what I'm saying is yes. If you've thought about it and are sure you want to do it, yes._

_Amelia sounds amazing. Why are all of your friends so great? I'm worried again that I'm too lame for all of you to be friends with me._

_Is James really that invested in Quidditch, or does he just have too much money and doesn't know what to do with it? What does he do with his old brooms? Puts them in a James Potter Quidditch museum?_

_Less than a week to go. I'm giddy._

_Love,  
_ _Really Jiggly Locks_

_P.S. I don't know what other foreign students will be doing, but if there's separate activities planned for them I want no part of it. I'm not coming there to spend time with them, I'm coming to spend time with you. So what I'll be doing when you're in class is be in class with you. What good teacher would stop a person from learning? Plus I'm a delight in class, they should be happy to have me._

 

**Rescue Joint Lives,**

**Yes. We have thought about it and we are sure, we’re going to be there for you that night. Only we can’t tell McGonagall or anyone for obvious reasons. It’s going to be good.**

**How dare you accuse my friends of not being lame? I only value the company of lame people. What’s the point in having friends if they’re not absolute nerds? You, Remus, are an absolute nerd. You’ll fit right in. On that note, though, yes, I am the very best at selecting friends. I just always seem to wind up with amazing ones.**

**Yes, both, as to your James question. He is extremely invested in quidditch and also money isn’t an obstacle for his family, so buying a new broom every year has never seemed abnormal. All of his old brooms are school brooms now, he donates them every September besides the ones he keeps at house for fun. I told him about your idea for the James Potter Quidditch Museum, though, and now he really wants to do that. I blame you.**

**Come to class with us! Yes! You deserve the full Hogwarts experience, awful classes and all! You can use my books and pair with me for potions and things. Do you want me to talk to professors about it now, or will you talk to McG?**

**Love,  
** **Stop Ostracizing Beetles**

**P.S. Four days.**

 

_Soap Oriented Bubbles,_

_Sirius. Sirius, I’m packing. Packing, Sirius. Packing to come see you, packing for Hogwarts. A few years late, and for a week, not a year, but still, very exciting. I don't have any robes though, do you think that will be weird? Do you think students from other schools will be in their uniforms? Should I bring my uniform from muggle school, or would that be even weirder? I still don't know where I'll be sleeping, do you think even if McGonagall allows me to stay in the Gryffindor dorms the other students will just be fine with it? Also, ew, there is no way I am coming with you to Potions._

_Thanks for the pasties by the way, they're all gone, I stress ate them thinking about your illegal animagi arses landing in Azkaban because of me. Tell me again why you being there is a good idea?_

_Can't wait to see you. Love,  
_ _Ridiculously Jittery Leprechaun_

 _P.S. Two days._  
_P.P.S. Do you want me to bring you anything? More candy or something?  
P.P.P.S. Don't let James start a museum! Doing that would ruin the last bit of hope for him and Lily to become friends._

**Regal Judge Lobster,**

**Okay. Okay, this is probably the last letter I’m going to send you before I meet you in person. Maybe it won’t even get to you in time, maybe by the time you read this I will already have hugged you. Was it nice? Was it a good hug? I’m an excellent hugger, it’s going to be a great hug.**

**It’s a good idea because this way you can relax, and know that you’re safe and that everyone else nearby will be safe because we’re your guardians. We won’t get caught and nobody is going to Azkaban, we’ve got this.**

**Come here, now!**

**Love and excitement,  
** **Stunning Oboe Baron**

 **P.S. You most certainly will go to potions with me! If you’re a Hogwarts student you need to be a full Hogwarts student, you can’t just skive off in your first and only week!  
** **P.P.S. Yes, bring your school uniform just because that sounds very cute. No idea if you’ll actually wear it.  
** **P.P.P.S I’ve managed to convince Jamie not to open a museum for now, but you’ll have to help me when you’re here.  
** **P.P.P.P.S. See you soon, Remus.**

 

_Soon Over By,_

_Fa got here just in time to come back with me. Dad’s apparating me to Hogsmeade in 10 minutes. This is really happening. See you at dinner!_

_Love,  
_ _Real Jovial Lad_

_P.S. I’m gonna send Fa ahead with this note when I get to Hogsmeade. In 8 minutes. Aaaa!!!_

 

Remus had never side-along-apparated quite so far. His stomach was in knots and his head was spinning by the time they landed in soft snow, powder consistency. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust – at first it seemed like maybe the whole world was just bright white light. Too slowly for his liking he began to make out the shapes of buildings and trees.  
  
His dad put a hand on his shoulder. “Ready?” he pointed up the street – or what must have been a street beneath the camouflaging snow – which disappeared around a curve. Remus nodded, not trusting his voice not to shake. “Are you sure you don’t want to stop for a butterbeer first? Three Broomsticks is right here on the left.”  
  
Remus squinted up ahead at a shop window that seemed slightly less foggy than the ones around it. The howl of the wind couldn’t drown out the clatter of people inside. “N-no. Not today. Maybe when you come to pick me up?”  
  
Lyall smiled straight ahead. “Sounds grand. You send that last letter?”  
  
“Oh!” Remus took the letter out of his back pocket and felt around for the latch to Fa’s cage with his free hand. “Short trip today, Fa. I’ll meet you there.” His heart felt too big for his chest.  
  
They walked the street quietly. It always struck Remus as odd how narrow and twisty wizard streets could get. Like alleyways only they were main streets. It was, he mused, probably a direct result of not needing to be concerned about things like cars and busses.  
  
They reached after only a few minutes’ walk they reached an enormous, iron gate. “What now?” he asked, turning to face his dad.  
Lyall’s smile widened and he nodded up to his left.  
  
Remus followed his father’s gaze up to a magnificent castle sitting up higher than the snowy rolling hills around it. Remus didn’t know how he could have missed it at first glance. He supposed the stones and bricks that made up its surface must be a deep charcoal colour, but the mist made it a soft, gentle grey. He could make out turrets through the frozen fog, and what he thought may have been windows, but he could have been imagining those onto it. “Oh.” The sound was quiet and involuntary in his throat.  
  
“I can’t believe it’s really happening this time. You’re going off to school.”  
  
Remus rolled his eyes at Lyall. “For a week, Dad. I’ll be back home before Christmas.”  
  
“Uh huh, if you remember who we are by then.” Lyall hugged him tight. “I love you, we’ll see you soon. Enjoy your time here, really enjoy it. And owl or floo home from McGonagall’s office anytime for any reason.”  
  
“I know, I know,” Remus felt peculiarly stuck to the ground. He willed his feet to move him through the gate. “I’ll see you soon.”  
  
The castle was much further away than it looked, and though Remus was rightly freezing in the chilly wind, he didn’t actually mind. He imagined walking up this unpaved path with his friends after a fun day in the village. Maybe they would have gone to the Three Broomsticks place his dad had pointed out. Or Honeydukes like Sirius had said they always go to. Yes. He definitely would have been walking back this way with Sirius if he was walking this way at all. He tried to imagine walking with Sirius next to him but quickly willed it away from his mind, physically shaking his head to dispel the idea. At this moment, anything besides the real Sirius Orion Black was nothing but laughable.  
  
The grounds were still and the enormous castle doors were closed when he approached. Remus stopped before them and took a breath. He tried to remember what Sirius had said about entering the castle. About the surface tension of the magic. He closed his eyes to try to feel it.  
  
There was a loud, rumbling sound that reminded Remus less of doors opening than it did of peeling thunder. The doors opened simultaneously. For a moment, Remus thought he had triggered them himself, but then he saw the witch standing just inside the entrance between them.  
  
She wore a deeply green robe and impressive, traditional witch’s hat. Her face was as thin and angular as her glasses. She had to be-  
  
“Professor McGonagall, pleased to meet you at long last. Mr. Lupin, if I presume correctly?” She waited for him to nod and held out her hand to shake his.  
  
“Excellent. Leave your belongings there and follow me. Your friends wanted to meet you at the gate, or at least here in the Entrance Hall with me, but they are in class. That was not enough of a deterrent, of course. I did tell them that if they so much as left their classroom to use a lavatory, I would personally see that they had detentions every night from now until the end of the year. I have told them you will await them in the Great Hall back from whence we came. We will all be gathering there shortly to greet the rest of our guests.”  
  
“But we’re not going to the Great Hall?” Remus managed to choke out.  
  
He had a thousand thoughts whirling around his head, each fighting to be said aloud. Or sung, or screamed. The castle was even more majestic on the inside than it was from the grounds. Lit sconces lined the staircases and corridors he was being led hastily down. The stones that made up the walls were all unique and sharp and must have been thousands of years old. He felt afraid to touch them, like his normalness might break them. The ground was uneven, or so his eyes could see. His feet didn’t feel the disparity at all, and he was sure it wasn’t only due to the numbness of shock. The presence of magic was in everything around him.  
  
“We are not. We are going to the Charms classroom. I thought you might like to wait for them there instead.” Remus smiled and nodded. He thought he might have seen her smile in response. “Excellent. Now, as for your arrangements, you will be sleeping in Gryffindor Tower. The students from other magical schools will have the option to sleep in the dormitories of their writing partners, or the accommodations provided by their respective schools. If this is in any way problematic for you, we will of course make other arrangements, but Mr. Black in particular seemed adamant that that wouldn’t be necessary. See me in my office if that is not the case. Your bag and owl cage have already been brought up to the correct dormitory. You will attend classes along with Mr. Black – that is, you will follow his school schedule for the coming week of classes. You are under no obligation to spend that time with Mr. Black, and again, if this becomes an issue for you, simply see me and we will find another solution. You’ll not miss out on your school experience regardless of the state of your friendship. Do be warned, however, that this next week of classes will include very little actual teaching, as we expect the presence of the other students to heavily affect the concentration of the students. All writing partners will be afforded the same option of attendance as you.” Remus couldn’t place why, but the Professor seemed less than happy about the last statement.  
  
Two students walked past them, panting like they’d very recently been running. They greeted Professor McGonagall and eyed Remus curiously. Remus thought he probably looked just as curious about them. They wore their robes so effortlessly. The innumerable times he’d tried his own on when they still fit had never felt so comfortable and casual. He still thought robes were incredibly old-fashioned.  
  
“Here you are, Mr. Lupin,” Professor McGonagall stopped in front of what looked like just another of the many doors in of the many corridors. Remus severely doubted his ability to navigate the castle on his own. Maybe Sirius, James, and Peter would let him borrow their map. “Would you like me to wait with you to make introductions, or will you be all right on your own?”  
  
Remus swallowed, throat dry. “I’ll be okay. Thank you, Professor. For taking me here and for everything.”  
  
It seemed like not enough. Of course it was not enough. But the Professor smiled at him with warmth that lit her face in an entirely different way. “Thank you, Mr. Lupin. For your patience and perseverance. You have waited far beyond long enough. Welcome to Hogwarts.”  
  
Remus smiled and waited for her to leave before he wiped his eyes.  
  
He stood in the hallway for ten minutes, first watching Professor McGonagall walk away, then taking in everything he had seen and felt getting to this point and everything presently around him. He pressed his fingers to the jagged stone wall and found it soft and forgiving. More notably, though, it did not crack beneath his normal hand.  
  
It only occurred to him then – once his heartrate had settled to something near normal, and his mind could find the spare energy to wonder about such things – that he didn’t have a watch or his cell phone, or any way to tell what time it was. Furthermore, he didn’t even know what time the present class was due to be dismissed. Sirius had said that some of their lessons were two hours long, but Professor McGonagall wouldn’t have just left him here if it was still going to be over an hour until the class was let out, right?  
  
At fifteen minutes of waiting, curiosity struck him. This moment, with time to spare before the other schools arrived, might be his only opportunity ever to witness a normally functioning Hogwarts class.  
  
As quietly as he could, he pressed the door to the classroom open. Just a crack. Just enough to see the enormous classroom, with vaulted a vaulted ceiling and candles floating around the room for light. Students, all in black robes, sat with their backs to him. He couldn’t make out enough of any of them to take a guess at whom Sirius might be, but the thought that he might just have seen him was thrilling. A little man in magenta robes stood at the head of the class, lecturing about euphoria-classified charms. He had learned about these weeks ago.  
  
He closed the door and covered his face with his hands. He felt his smile pull at the scars across his face, it was so wide. “Merlin,” he muttered quietly, then laughed at himself for talking to himself out loud.   
  
It was only a minute or two after that that he heard the scuffle of chairs and ruffling of books and parchment that must have meant the end of the class. His stomach turned over and his heart went into over-drive. His skin felt suddenly too warm, which was remarkable, considering the the cold of outside still hadn’t left his bones.  
  
Before he had time to be too amused with this, the door burst open, and a student hurled themselves out of it, crashing right into Remus and bouncing backwards.  
  
“Merlin, Sirius, slow down!” someone still inside the classroom hollered. Remus’s heart stopped. The name rolled around Remus’s ears and echoed in his head.  
  
“Oh fuck- sorry! Ow. I’m sorry.” Sirius caught himself, staggering. He didn’t even glance at Remus and he looked ready to continue bolting down the hall.  
  
“That’s alright, best friend,” Remus said before Sirius could run off.  
  
Sirius stumbled to a halt. Remus desperately tried to take in all of him at once. He was never going to get another chance to see his best friend for the first time. But he only had time to register dark hair and a brilliant, beautiful smile before Sirius was too close to look at.  
  
“Remus!” Sirius yelled into Remus’s shoulder, arms around his neck. “You’re Remus, you’re my Remus friend!”  
  
Remus held him close and shook with laughter that was too full of jittery exuberance to make any noise. “I’m almost entirely sure that I am Remus, yes.”

“You’re here! You’re at Hogwarts! Welcome to school, welcome home! Where are you sleeping? Where are your things? How did you find the class we were in? Do you have somewhere to be, now?” Sirius spoke quickly and with complete earnest. Remus could hear the rapid-fire questions of his letters so clearly.

“I’m here,” he nodded, never loosening his embrace. “I am, this is real. I’m staying with you in your dorm, if that’s okay with everyone. McGonagall brought me here, she just said I need to be back in the Great Hall to welcome visitors when everyone else goes to do that, I think.”

Sirius squeezed Remus extra close, and then dropped his arms slowly. “Oka- oh! Remus! Meet James and Peter!”

Remus hugged each of the other boys. James was built like a runner, long, solid limbs, dark skin, darker hair that flopped in every imaginable direction. Peter was soft and edgeless, warm arms and trusting eyes. And then Remus was finally able to get a good look at Sirius. He was smaller than both Peter and James, looking up at Remus with shining, light eyes of an indeterminate colour. His hair was dark like James’s, but long and silky. It tucked behind his ears and brushed against his neck and shoulders. He looked like an antique portrait brought to life. Remus needed to consciously remind himself to blink to keep from staring.

There was an empty hour before they needed to get to the Great Hall for the main event of the day – of everyone else’s day, anyway. It was all downhill for Remus from there. Or so he thought. But the three boys showing Remus around the essential parts of the castle proved to be anything but falling action.

Remus loved everything about Hogwarts Castle. The enormous, unnecessarily ornate windows; the courtyards in places that made no sense to have a courtyard; the suits of armor that seemed to be friends with each other. They agreed that they wouldn’t be showing Remus any of the secret passages on his first day there. He wanted the Hogwarts experience in its purest, most natural form to begin with.

By the time they made it back to the Entrance Hall, students had gathered and were slowly pouring into the Great Hall. It gave Remus time to look around – something he’d been too overwhelmed to do the first time he’d been through. He found the huge hourglasses filled gems to match the colour of the houses they represented against the far wall. Slytherin was in a shallow lead over Hufflepuff at the moment. Remus was overjoyed that he would be staying in Gryffindor tower with Sirius and James and Peter and Lily and Mary, people he knew, and that he would be attending classes with them. But he couldn’t help but wonder if things were different, what house would he be cheering for? Which hour glass would hold meaning to him if he were the one acquiring points for it?

 

He followed Sirius, James, and Peter past the fourteen gigantic Christmas trees he’d only just registered, through the entrance to the Great Hall and had to put a hand on Sirius’s arm to stabilize himself.

The sky was deep blue and smudged with thick clouds. It was snowing. The sky. In the dining hall. The snow drifted down and disappeared a mere ten feet above his head. He kept waiting for a stray flake to land on his nose – for the wind that swirled the white specs around to muss his hair and make him shiver. But he stayed warm and dry and the shiver that did come over his skin had nothing to do with the temperature of the room.

“Pretty, right?” Sirius leaned into Remus’s hand, like a hug without an embrace.

“It’s… stunning. There aren’t words enough for it.” Remus felt Sirius moving forward and moved with him, but didn’t take his eyes off of the ceiling. Every so often his vision would become obscured by the bottom of a floating candle. There were hundreds of them, lighting the room from above as much as it was lit by the ornate sconces on the walls. “Is it always this spectacular, or is this a special evening for the guests?”

“Nah, this is how it always is. Told you I get lost in it sometimes.” Sirius led him to the designated Gryffindor table, the farthest from the entrance, and waited for Remus to sit before he did so himself. James and Peter took seats across from them. They were deeply absorbed in a conversation about one of their earlier classes.

Remus took in the room and the students and the tables and the dishware and tried his very hardest not to look at Sirius, because he knew if he glanced over at his friend, he’d never stop looking.

“Tell me everything that’s happening in your head right now,” Sirius demanded. Reflexively, Remus looked down at him and immediately he knew he had been right. He never needed to look at anything else for the rest of his life.

“That would be impossible.”

Sirius smiled and it felt like the most familiar smile Remus had ever seen. How many of those smiles were packed into the letters he kept under his bed? “Okay, fair enough, then tell me one thing that’s happening in your head right now.”

Remus sifted through his many, jumbled thoughts for something he could put into intelligible words. “You’re really pretty.” It wasn’t what he’d meant to say, but he didn’t regret it for a moment. Sirius’s eyes lit brighter than the hundreds of candles around them. He looked like he was about to say something, but there was a sudden hush, too abrupt to be sourceless.

Professor Dumbledore had entered the room from a side door near the professors’ table at the head of the room. He walked gracefully to the wrong side of the table and held his hands up in greeting.

“Good evening, Hogwarts students,” his voice was magnified by magic, Remus could only assume. He smiled at the sea of students like he was smiling at each one of them individually. “This evening is one we’ve all been waiting for, for some time, now.”

Since Remus had not technically been addressed by the headmaster as had the rest of the students, he didn’t feel terribly obligated to pay much attention. He took in more of the Great Hall while Professor Dumbledore made some auspicious speech about making friends and allies and international comradery. He could probably look around this room every day for seven years and never fully see all of its detail. The walls were as rough as those of the halls, but at a closer look there were paintings on them. Worn, old paintings made directly onto the stone, chipped and cracked and eroded and beautiful. The ones Remus could make out as human in shape seemed to be ignoring Dumbledore as diligently as he was.

Remus’s attention eventually did find its way back to the headmaster, but not until he was announcing the arrival of the other students. “Without further fanfare, let me introduce the students of Beauxbatons, Castelobruxo, Durmstrang, and Uagadou!”

This was the genuinely exciting part of the evening. Everyone turned, noisy with anticipation, to the doors that led out to the Entrance Hall. Remus found himself as anxious for their arrival as every other student, even though he’d already found his penpal.

They filed in in clusters, first the students from Beauxbatons, then Castelobruxo, then Durmstrang, then Uagadou. Remus estimated there to be between one and two hundred of each uniform pouring into the room. They stood against the walls, obviously having rehearsed the motions, or at least been given careful instruction to do so.

Remus had been in awe of the size of the castle throughout their quick tour, earlier, but suddenly he was worried there wouldn’t be enough room for everyone. It was probably an absurd thought, but the student body had just effectively doubled in size.

The tables were buzzing with chatter and rippling with students standing and craning their necks to see if they could find their new friends.

“Welcome, welcome, everyone!” Dumbledore called for everyone’s attention. “In a moment, you will be able to locate your friends and acquaintances. But first! I believe we’ll need to make some room.” Dumbledore waved his wand and the house tables stretched at the ends, creating more sitting space at each. He nodded to what must have been the other headmasters – four professors who had entered last, and each wore similar but not identical robes to their students.

The four heads of school called something out to their students in their respective languages. French, Portuguese, Bulgarian, and Bantu. Remus could understand none of it, but all of the guest students around the hall held up their wands – well, all except for the students of Uagadou, who only raised their hands out in front of them – and drew something into the air before them. Remus squinted to see what it was. The nearest group of people was a few Beauxbatons students. Remus could make out the words _Adeline_ , _Enzo_ , and _Camille_. Their names. These were their names. Remus wondered if anyone else in the hall had been raised by at least one muggle and was also thinking that some nametags would do them well right about now.

“If you wish to do so at this time, you may now find your friends. Good luck to all, and enjoy the feast, which will be presented shortly!” Remus was relieved that Dumbledore seemed to finally be done talking.

There was a tremendous commotion as nearly the entire school leapt from their seats to go find their partners. Sirius turned toward Remus and grabbed his arm. “I found my friend!” he beamed. Remus hugged him again.

Remus hugged all of his friends, it wasn’t a new thing. But hugging Sirius felt so surreal. It would probably melt into normal over the next few days, but in the back of his mind, a bit of him wished it wouldn’t. He didn’t want the novelty of this to dissipate. He didn’t want to take Sirius or the others, or the castle, for that matter, for granted.

Sirius sat very close to Remus, practically leaning on him while they watched the students around them greet each other. Remus had been worried that there were going to be a lot of people with experiences similar to James, with his first penpal, but most of the introductions he could see seemed incredibly positive.

“Remus John Lupin!” someone shouted from behind Remus.

He turned to find who had called him and he knew her instantly. “I’m Lily and I’m so fucking happy to meet you! Can I hug you, would that be okay?”

“God, yes, of course!” Remus stood up to hug her. It was like hugging the warmest, most comforting pillow. Her thick arms closed around him and he could have fallen asleep right there.

“I’ve got to run, I’m going to find Nat, but I really wanted to say hi to you and I saw you from the other end of the table and I can’t believe you’re really here!” She squeezed him – gentle but sincere – one more time and ran off.

Sirius stood up next to Remus and leaned in to say something, but was accosted by Peter.

“Sirius, help! I can’t find her anywhere, Jaqui, she said she’d be here and I have no idea what she looks like!”

“Did you ask the headmistress?” Sirius asked.

“I can’t just ask! That would involve talking to a person, help me, please.” Sirius looked back at Remus, who waved him along, and led Peter over to the Beauxbatons headmistress.

Remus stood where he was for a while, enjoying the moment. People seemed to forget which house tables were which in all the commotion and landed wherever they pleased to talk to their friends.

Very few people had chosen not to get up and search the newcomers, and most of them had banded together. One person was left at the Hufflepuff table, sitting slouched over, apparently completely unamused by her surroundings.

It was a heroic effort getting over to the person that could only be Marlene, but Remus eventually wound his way through the swells of students to sit beside her. She looked at him and there was recognition in her eyes, but she said nothing. Remus knew he had the right witch.

They sat in silence for a long while. Marlene scowled down at the table and Remus continued watching the cheerful unions around him. The novelty of them was wearing off a bit and he sort of wished everyone would sit down and speak more quietly. He wanted to sit and look up at the ceiling sky and, most importantly, to try some of the Hogwarts food he’d been imagining for six years.

“I’m giving it two more minutes before I start hitting the loud ones with silencing charms.” Marlene glared at a passing group of boys who all seemed to be yelling over one another in various languages.

Remus snorted. “You’re a kinder soul than I, I was going to give them one.”

Marlene smirked.

When Peter was safely engaged in what looked like the nerdiest conversation he’d ever seen, Sirius danced through the crowd back to where he’d left Remus, near their usual spot at Gryffindor Table. Only he wasn’t there. Sirius’s first reflex was to panic. That Remus had gotten lost, that he’d run off to get away from Sirius, that he’d left the castle entirely. But it was only a moment before he spotted him across the hall at the Hufflepuff table, laughing with Marlene. Not laughing _adjacent to_ Marlene, laughing _with_ her. As in she, too, was laughing. A few nearby Hogwarts students were staring, just as Sirius was.

He approached them and sat on Remus’s other side, desperately hoping he wasn’t intruding on an attempt by Remus to get away from him.

By the time the food was served, they had been spotted by James and Peter, who brought their penpals over to sit with them. It was a feast that truly outdid itself. Sirius assumed that the house elves had been instructed to show off to the best of their abilities. Everything was rich and plated even more artfully than usual.

Remus was beside himself. Sirius watched with delight as Remus took one of absolutely everything he could get his hands on and pined for the things that were too far away. Sirius didn’t know where he was putting it all, he just kept eating. They talked through the meal and it was wonderfully easy. Like writing letters but faster. Occasionally someone else would insert themselves into the conversation for a bit. Marlene’s penpal had eventually found her and was sitting next to her, but talking mostly with the group next to theirs.

 

Remus put a hand on his own stomach. “I’ve never been less ready for anything in my entire life. You say I have to go up to a tower after all that?”

“Well, nobody said you had to eat the entire Hufflepuff table and _then_ walk up to a tower, you made that set of choices all on your own.”

Remus whimpered and Sirius tried to admonish him, but it was quite cute.

McGonagall stood on the stairs of the Entrance Hall and stopped them when they tried to follow the other students up. “Mr. Lupin, Mr. Black, my office please.”

Sirius was outraged. “Professor, we haven’t even done anything wrong yet!”

She eyed him with exasperation. “Your ‘yet’ disturbs me somewhat. No, this is not about you being in trouble, _yet_. I thought maybe it was time Mr. Lupin was properly sorted. Bring whomever you see fit, anyone who is friendly with Mr. Lupin, for an audience and meet me in my office. I expect you there in six minutes’ time.”

Remus gaped at her. Sirius gave him a moment for that sentiment to sink in – he was going to be sorted as a Hogwarts student.

 

They walked together to McGonagall’s office while Peter scurried off to find Kingsley, Amelia, Lily, and Marlene.

“Nervous?” Sirius asked. Remus had been awfully quiet.

“Kind of, yeah. It’s a lot of build-up and… you don’t think I’ll have to stay in whatever house I get into, do you? I’m here as your guest, not as an actual student, so I’d still stay with you, right?”

“Oh, yes, obviously. They can pry you from my cold dead fingers, you’re staying in Gryffindor tower no matter what this dumb hat says,” Sirius assured him.

They waited anxiously for the others before McGonagall set out the three-legged stool that was never meant for a body quite as _long_ as Remus’s. He scrunched himself up onto it and McGonagall was just about to set it on his head when Sirius shouted, “WAIT!”

McGonagall glared, but it was important, he didn’t care. “Remus, listen. I don’t care what house you’re in, yeah? Any one of them, you’re my friend, and you belong with all of us. Okay, continue.”

“I can’t even count the school rules this is breaking, but if anyone should give you a hard time about it, Mr. Lupin, you can kindly have them answer to me. This moment should have been yours years ago.” Remus smiled while McGonagall set the hat on his head.

It deliberated for a long moment while Amelia and James quietly exchanged several galleons, no doubt betting on the outcome.

“Gryffindor!”

Peter, James, and Lily screamed. Everyone else applauded, McGonagall particularly loudly. She looked as proud as Sirius felt.

When they were out of McGonagall’s office, Sirius through his arms around Remus.

“Congratulations, Gryffindor,” he said quietly in Remus’s ear.

Remus didn’t let him go. For a long moment they just held each other. Then Remus practically whispered, “It said it had been waiting for me. That usually when it’s stuck waiting for a student it never gets to meet the student. And it said I belong here.”

“Well, obviously, Remus, you do belong here.”

“I know, but… It seemed significant.”

Sirius squeezed him. He remembered when the hat had told him that he was different than his family. He, too, had already known that fact. But hearing it stated like a fact by something that was magically meant to find truths made it feel real and solid. Sirius thought he might know how Remus was feeling better than he could vocalize.

They finished their tour from before dinner and met back up with the others well before curfew. By the time they got to the tower, everyone was exhausted. James and Peter had said goodnight to their penpals outside of the common room. The tower was mostly empty, with all its occupants busy taking their foreign partners on tours of their favourite places in the castle.

It was the perfect opportunity for Remus to fully enjoy the Gryffindor Common Room and sixth year boys’ dormitory, but he didn’t even have the energy to appreciate it.

“But I want to sit in the comfy spot by the fire, and look at the study desks and memorize the ceiling,” Remus whined.

“Tomorrow, there’s so much more time tomorrow,” Sirius promised.

Peter made it through the door to the dormitory first. “Oh, yes, this is so much better. Much more feng shui. I’m into this.”

Sirius saw what he meant when he made it through himself. Their dorm had been somewhat rearranged to include a fourth bed, putting two beds on either side of the door in the circular room, splitting it in half from dorm to window. It was symmetrical in a way Peter would of course enjoy.

Remus’s bed was close to Sirius’s. After the nightly ritual of getting ready for bed – a nightly ritual for most in the room, at least – they lied down facing each other. The last thing Sirius saw before he fell into the floating blackness of sleep was Remus’s perfect, content smile.


	9. Chapter 9

Remus was dreaming. It was a good one. The kind he regretted waking up from as soon as he felt reality begin to seep into the corners of it. He tried to pull himself back into it. What had been happening? James. He was at Hogwarts, and James was talking to someone about some spell he’d read in a book that he wanted to try. He wanted to sleep and to lie and listen to James’s voice forever. 

Just when he thought he might as well get it over with and wake himself up fully, something landed on his bed in a bewildering moment of chaos.

“Rise and shimmer, Rodent Joke Learner! It’s your first full day at Hogwarts and I’ll eat my wand if I’m gonna let you spend it in bed!” Sirius’s face landed on the pillow next to Remus and his smile was so close, Remus couldn’t believe it. 

He reached out and touched Sirius’s face. Over the abrupt noisiness of his best friend, he could hear James still telling Peter about the newly discovered spell. 

“This is not a dream,” Remus said to himself, though he still wasn’t positive he was awake.

“No, it is not. If it were a dream, your eyes would still probably be closed.” Sirius poked Remus’s cheek, just below his left eye. His hand was still on Sirius’s face, but Sirius did nothing to remove it, so neither did Remus. “Now get up and get dressed! There’s so much castle to see before classes!”

He had been dead on his feet the previous evening. Still, Remus couldn’t believe he’d let himself walk through the common room without stopping to take it in. He rectified that mistake quickly.

As soon as he was dressed, he and Peter went down to the common room to wait for Sirius and James, who took longer getting ready. Remus went straight for the softest looking bit of sofa and flopped down onto it. 

“Oh, no, this is lovely,” he complained. 

Peter sat on the floor beside him and laughed. “It’s not so bad. The really good spot is there, though, by the fire. ‘Specially on cold nights when you’re up just a bit too late. Perfection.”

Remus heeded his word and found the really good spot. Peter was not wrong. From his spot on the sofa, he watched the students around him, moving about their home. There were shelves of books near the study area, Remus would have to go over and see what kinds of books were kept specifically in Gryffindor Tower, rather than in the library.

“Hey, can we see the library today?” he asked Peter.

“Oh, yeah, of course! James’ll be thrilled, he’s looking for an excuse to get up there.”

Breakfast was incredible, as Remus had begrudgingly accepted that it would be when he smelled it from two floors up. He asked whether this was standard fare or if it was Hogwarts, again, showing off for their guests, but Sirius told him that the only difference between that and a normal breakfast was that there was a lot more of it.

Lily came over as Remus was piling food onto his plate for a third time, much to Sirius’s fascination. She was every bit as wonderful as Remus had imagined her to be. They talked about movies, all the good ones Lily was missing while she was here at school, and muggle school. Lily, Remus learned, took summer classes when she wasn’t at Hogwarts, so she was still learning  _ some _ practical muggle information. 

Before the students from the other schools who had not slept in the castle – which was most – arrived, Remus managed to track down Amelia and Kingsley, as well as Mary and Marlene so that he could give everyone their Christmas-Hanukkah gifts.

The gifts were personalized pens – a star on Sirius’s, a guitar on Mary’s, a rat on Peter's, etc – which Lyall had helped Remus charm very specifically.

“So you each have your own, and I have mine, and you see this little window on the side? If I write out your name, and a comma, whatever I write next appears in your little window. See?”

Sirius, Lily, and Amelia were all amazed. Everyone else was still struggling to accept the pen itself as a useful item. Remus would not be deterred in his quest to get the whole school writing efficiently with pens.

After breakfast, Remus went with Sirius to his divination class. He was surprised at how normal the class seemed. Desks and chairs and notes and practice, like any other lesson. The professor was ancient and quite unaware of her physical body. She kept walking into things and people and walls without seeming to care, and every time she took a pause while she was speaking, Remus feared she had died and he would look up to see her fall to the ground.

He knew the class was not a standard one. He wasn’t the only visitor, after all, but Remus borrowed a roll of parchment from Sirius and wrote out notes like he would in any other class. After he managed to raise his hand and answer questions correctly twice in a five minute span, he decided he liked Divination.

As much as he enjoyed it, however, classes took a lot out of Remus, and by the time Sirius was leading him to the Great Hall for lunch, not only was Remus sure that he couldn’t perform as well as he had been in subsequent classes, but that he couldn’t do much of anything else, either. 

He took a sandwich for the journey and hugged Sirius goodbye to make his own way back to Gryffindor Tower so he could lie down.

~

Remus had been a beacon all morning. He really was just the biggest nerd Sirius had ever met, and that filled him with affection. He lit up every time he understood something, and radiated when he was called upon to share that understanding. He took more notes than Sirius, which was amazing, considering he’d never need to take the exam for which they might be useful.

Sirius tried not to be worried when Remus said he needed to lie down, rather than attend afternoon classes. He knew that this was as close to routine for Remus as anything. He climbed the stairs to the boys’ dormitories, carrying a bowl of stew from dinner, consumed with anxious thoughts, despite this knowledge.

“Hey, Remus?” he pushed the door open slowly, giving Remus a moment to collect himself if he wanted to.

When there was no answer, Sirius entered. Remus’s bed was empty. 

There was a moment of confusion before Sirius heard a rustling coming from his own bed and turned to see Remus fidgeting with the sheets there.

He sat on the edge of his own bed. Remus’s face was flushed and his hair was flat on one side. He looked utterly sweet. “Remus,” Sirius nudged him softly. “Hey, how are you feeling?”

Remus yawned widely and stretched his legs out. “’M okay,” he replied, but Sirius didn’t believe him. “Sorry I took your bed, you can have it back. I just came up here and I was so out of it and it smells like you.”

“It smells like me?” Sirius asked. 

“Mhm. Smells nice, like you. It’s a really comforting smell to me right now.” His already pink face filled with even more colour. “I’m sorry. That sounds so creepy out loud, I’m making this weird, I’ll go-”

When he tried to sit up, Sirius pressed a gentle hand to his chest. “No, no. You stay. How are you feeling about cuddles right now?”

Remus took a quick assessment of his body. “Feeling very good about cuddles.”

“Good, enough room for me?” Sirius kicked off his shoes and stripped down to his shirt and pants and crawled into bed beside Remus. It was delightful. Their bodies fit perfectly to one another. Sirius put an arm around Remus and Remus snuggled further into Sirius. Nothing had ever felt so perfectly correct in all his life.

Just before Remus drifted to sleep, Sirius kissed his forehead and whispered, “I can’t believe you managed to skive off class on your very first day at Hogwarts.”

Remus snorted, and at some point it became a snore.

~

_ You’re wasting a day _ .

Remus stared up at the ceiling over his bed in the Hospital Wing, despising himself. His bones felt gelatinous and achy with the impending change and simply turning over on the cot left him breathless. And all the while he couldn’t help but think of all the ways he’d rather be spending the day.

“Do you wish you hadn’t come before the moon?” Sirius asked, late in the day. He’d dutifully returned to Remus’s side between every class – even the ones with little break between them – and brought him food from dinner, even though Madam Pomfrey had already accommodated every meal. 

James and Peter visited at mealtimes as well. It had been just after breakfast - when they had first come to be with him and Madam Pomfrey had trusted them to keep themselves in order while she ran an errand – when Sirius had asked Remus the question he hadn’t known he’d been waiting to be asked.

“Hey, Remus, would you want to meet our furrier selves before you spend the night with them?”

Remus had been thinking a lot about how his friends would be transforming into animals to keep him safe – _ and to keep everyone safe from him –  _ but he had not given much of that thought to what they would be like when they did. He’d forgotten, in all of the excitement of Hogwarts and meeting students from all over the world, and existing in the wizard world at all, how excited he was to meet Padfoot.

“Yes. Definitely yes. But is it safe?”

Sirius just shrugged and laughed. And then he was gone. He sort of knelt down, but too quickly to be intentional and too gracefully to be falling. And then where he stood, instead, stood a great big, black, furry, panting dog.

Remus yelled in alarm and covered his mouth. There was no one else in the hospital wing at the moment, but he didn’t want to draw attention from any passers bye near enough to hear.

Padfoot jumped up onto the bed and sat by Remus’s side, where there was some room. Remus raised a hand slowly and ran his fingers through his fur. It was soft, incredibly soft. More like Sirius’s hair than actual dog hair. Padfoot licked his arm, tail wagging. Remus scratched him behind the ear and Padfoot squinted and whined contently. 

Remus nearly leapt up and ran when a rat came scrambling up his leg over the bedsheets. “Peter! Merlin, fuc-“ but he didn’t have time to finish his thought, because there’s something about being deliberately approached by a massive, regal looking stag that puts everything else out of one’s mind. Prongs lowered his head so that his antlers just gently brushed Remus’s side. It was surreal.

They only had a few minutes before Padfoot’s ears perked and Prongs froze where he stood. Wormtail dove off the bed and in the same instant, Peter was standing next to him. “Pomfrey.”

The weight of the bed shifted to accomadate Sirius’s human body, sitting comfortably right next to Remus, and James stood just behind him, before Remus even saw them move. By the time Madame Pomfrey had returned, it was like nothing had happened.

The memories of the morning had kept him almost sane through most of the day, but at the point when Sirius had asked the question, “do you wish you hadn’t come before the moon?” he was all out of positivity.

Or he thought he was, until he opened his mouth to respond. “No. I wouldn’t trade the last two days for a hundred of this day.”

Sirius smiled and kept reading the passage he had previously interrupted from his homework. 

~

A bit before sundown, when everyone else was at dinner, Madame Pomfrey led Remus onto the grounds, past the little camps that were presently home to the students from other schools.

The Whomping Willow was somehow almost endearing to him. Madame Pomfrey stopped him just outside of the tree’s range of motion and muttered some spell, aiming it at a specific knot on the trunk. The boughs halted where they were, blowing only slightly in the light wind. Like it had never been anything but a normal willow tree. 

The tunnel that led from the base of the tree to the shack in Hogsmeade felt longer than the walk from the village to the castle. It was possible that the feeling had something to do with Remus’s aching, stinging bones and crawling skin, as the moon threatened his body, and the low ceiling of the tunnel forcing him to bend over for the entirety of the walk did not help.

When they reached the shack, Remus’s heart hurt, and it had nothing to do with the impending transformation. Everything was covered in a thick layer of dust, but it was evident that someone had once tried to make the place nice. There was a large, plain table and six dining chairs. The walls were done up in severely dated but strangely charming wallpaper. It was a far cry from the small, damp room with cement walls in the lowest level of St. Mungo’s, in which he usually spent his full moons.

Madame Pomfrey led him up the stairs. He got a bit of a look in each of the rooms – an empty kitchen, a bathroom, two small bedrooms and one large one. He sat on the enormous four poster bed in the largest bedroom while Madame Pomfrey put the necessary charms on the doors and windows.

Quietly, he took out his personal pen and the scrap of parchment he’d crammed into his pocket before leaving the hospital wing. 

_ Sirius Black _ , he wrote,  _ Hey, Padfoot. There’s a knot on the willow tree, mid-trunk on the southern side. I don’t know what spell she used to do it, but she did something to that and the tree went all still, and an opening appeared near the roots. See you soon. _

It felt like an eternity that he stared at the little window on the pen, waiting for a response. Waiting for Sirius to say ‘never mind, we just realized how dangerous this could be, see you tomorrow.’ But when the words came scrawling across the window, they said  _ Rad Jewish Loser, we’ll see you in a little bit. As soon as Pomfrey comes out, we’ll go in. Get comfortable, we’ll be there soon. Sooner Or Before.  _

He should probably have felt more nervous, knowing his friends were going ahead with the plan to put themselves in danger, but he could feel nothing but comfort and relief. 

Madame Pomfrey left without too much fuss, which Remus appreciated. If the clock in the bedroom was correct, he had about an hour left until the change. He felt strangely exposed. He’d been assured that the shack was completely secure, but all the same he thought he might entrap himself in a single room for the change if he could manage it. This much space felt like allowing the beast to have too much. Not that the shack was by any means large, but it was larger than the room in the hospital he was used to.

He explored the other rooms while he waited for Sirius, James, and Peter. The furniture didn’t all match but much of it did. It was simple and comfortable and had clearly never been used. Like an eerie abandoned furniture showroom. Someone had gone to the trouble to make the place homey. Someone, Remus thought, who intended to house a child there for several days per year. Why? Why had Dumbledore bothered to furnish and decorate and then simply stopped caring about Remus after the fact?

He was sitting on the bench in front of the piano when he heard voices in the tunnel beyond the hidden opening in the wall across from him.

“Ow! I think this must be it.”

“We’ve been walking for days, it has to be.”

“It’s not that much farther than Honeydukes, surely.”

“Nah, can’t be if it’s at all a direct route, they’re on the same street.”

“How do we get in?”

“Err, just go?”

“But Pomfrey’s put up defenses.”

“Against werewolves, not punk-arse kids. Try it.”

Peter came tumbling through first, followed by Sirius. James strolled through after, patiently. “Ah, Remus! Nice place!” he nodded approvingly, looking around the room as though he was being welcomed into Remus’s home.

“Thanks, the rest of my belongings should be arriving shortly,” he jested. Sirius came to sit on the bench with him.

“Ohh, do you play?” he asked.

“Me? Not at all. Pretty, though, isn’t it?” Remus drew his fingers over the dusty keys.

“How’s your head? Still hurting like earlier? I could play something for you.”

“You haven’t played in years!” James accused. Peter had transformed into Wormtail and was exploring the room.

“Shut up, I still could.”

“Maybe later,” Remus smiled wearily. His head was still throbbing along with the rest of the pain he was in.

Slowly, he showed them around and they landed in the large bedroom. “I’m going to lock myself in here, I think. I don’t really like the idea of it running around the shack.”

“Scared it’ll get out?” James asked, “Because we’re here for that. We’ll make sure nothing bad happens, I promise.” He said the words ‘I promise’ with such earnest, Remus couldn’t help but feel comforted.

“Not really, more like I don’t want it to have too much of a nice thing,” Remus admitted. It sounded callous out loud, but he didn’t really care.

 

When he felt the familiar pull of his ligaments he told the others it was time. They hugged him, each more gently than the last, and left the room. Sirius talked to him through the door while Remus quietly disrobed and pulled the blanket from the bed around himself. He went on about some of the students from Castelobruxo that had been caught sneaking into the Forbidden Forest “like total amateurs”. Remus listened contently, and warned Sirius before he put up the silencing charm.

“Okay, I’ll see you tomorrow, Remus. I love you.”

Remus’s heart spasmed. “I love you too. Be safe.”

 

Sirius heard the quiet, metallic sound of the silencing spell being cast and pulled his knees up to his chin. 

“Hey, he’s gonna be okay,” James laid his head on Sirius’s shoulder. They both sat with their backs against the door. James looked down at his watch. “Moon’s fully up in three. Want to change now?”

Sirius nodded and called to Peter, who had been further conquesting the rest of the rooms, to come be with them. 

“So we just stand guard out here all night?” he asked while James and Sirius stood up and brushed the dust off of themselves. 

“That’s the plan. If we start getting sleepy later, we can take shifts. Just as long as either Sirius or I is awake at all times, in case something should happen.”

They transformed and waited in the quiet. Peter and Sirius chased each other up and down the hall to work off some of the anxiety, while James stood solemn watch of the door to the bedroom on the right.   
  


Sirius was aware of the wolf in a way he’d never be able to perceive in human form. He could hear every breath and growl, and every time the wolf’s mood shifted, the hair on Sirius’s neck stood up. When he grew too preoccupied with this to continue playing catch-the-rat, he sat, alert, next to Prongs. The wolf shifted on the other side of the door and Sirius was consumed with the instinct to bark and provoke it, but he fought the urge. He settled for waiting. The wolf was preparing for attack, and Sirius was ready. 

It wasn’t an attack in the same sense as creatures in the forest had attacked Padfoot before. There was no maliciousness or hunger in the warning growls. If Sirius had to identify it, he would call it curiosity. Something between hunt and play. Uneasy but not entirely defensive.

When he felt the wolf readying himself, Sirius  _ did _ bark. Partly to warn James and partly because it felt really good to yell. Peter scurried away, and Sirius could smell him taking cover in something in the kitchen. Probably a cupboard or something, as his smell grew fainter all at once.

The wolf broke down the door in seconds. Only its second attempt, throwing its entire weight into the heavy wood. The door shattered. They’d have to repair that later. 

Prongs stood as first defense, bowed, sturdy, impenetrable. He looked massive in the small hallway. Sirius crouched low behind him, baring his teeth silently, ready to intimidate if necessary. 

But the wolf didn’t show any sign of wanting to fight the stag and the dog. He sniffed, still tense. First the air, then, with growing bravery, Prongs’s antlers. When it was apparent that he wasn’t going to attack, Prongs allowed the creature to step closer. Sirius moved to stand next to Prongs, just behind one of his legs. The hallway didn’t exactly allow them to stand side by side. 

The wolf approached him slowly and sniffed at his ear. Its snout was smaller than Sirius’s, and its eyes were green like Remus’s. They lacked the spark that made Remus’s eyes so interesting to look at, though. Its fur was roughly the same shade of taupe as Remus’s hair. 

Sirius moved out from under Prongs and for a moment, he and the wolf circled and smelled each other. Then the wolf pounced.

Prongs nearly gored him. In an instant he had the wolf pinned to the wall between his antlers, but in the next he realized what Sirius had realized while the wolf was making the attack. It was playing. James let him go and Sirius made a dive for the wolf’s hide, but it was too quick for him. Sirius was elated. The wolf was going to be a far more entertaining sparring partner than Wormtail. 

 

Padfoot and the wolf brawled through the night. Prongs occasionally joined in the fun, and even Wormtail managed to sneak in a few nips. The wolf was only distressed by the sudden presence of the rat for a moment, before he accepted him as part of the pack and gnashed at him playfully.

They managed to keep the wolf in the shack, without it even trying to escape. They did not, however, manage to save most of the furniture. By the time the wolf was exhausted and curled up in the corner to sleep, there was very little left of the dining room. The table stood precariously on three legs, with a great chunk missing from its side. Only two of the chairs were left unscathed, and piano keys were strewn over the floor like so much pixie dust.

When he was sure the wolf was asleep, he went to check the time. 5:12. They had some time left. Not much, but enough. The moon wasn’t scheduled to set fully until 7:04, if Sirius’s astronomical calculations were correct, which of course they were. He wedged himself between the wolf and the wall of the dining room and lied down, curling around the wolf twice his size.

~

When Remus woke up, he was dizzy with disorientation. He was warm. He was resting on something very warm and very soft. There was a blanket over him. He was not in St. Mungo’s, and he wasn’t in the bedroom where he had transformed the evening before. He blinked the sleep from his eyes and sat up to take in his surroundings. 

Broken furniture and debris cluttered the area, but the wallpaper made it still recognizable as the dining room area in the lower part of the shack. He turned his body and found that he wasn’t in excruciating pain, as he was used to on the days succeeding full moons. He drew his fingers over his face and neck and checked the parts of his body he could see without leaving the warmth of the blanket, and there didn’t seem to be so much as a scratch on him. 

The warm, soft something beneath him stirred and he realized at once that he was sleeping on Padfoot. He scooted forward to let the dog up. Wormtail was fast asleep at the foot of Remus’s blanket. 

“Good morning, Remus,” Remus could just see James in the little morning light that came through the small windows near the ceiling. He was carrying something in his hands, and he set it down beside Remus. “How are you feeling?”

Remus felt the lump and recognized it as his clothing. He kept the blanket over him while he pulled his jumper over his head, but James turned away anyway to offer him privacy. Padfoot moved out from under him and in the very next moment, Sirius came crawling to his side.

“I feel… incredible. Like, I’m not going to go running any marathons, today, but I’ve never felt this good after a moon. What happened last night?”

Remus’s unease grew as the two of them – and Peter, once he woke up and transformed, himself – recounted the events of the previous night. They had  _ played _ with the wolf. Messed around with it. It liked games. It liked fighting. And it hadn’t harmed any of them. 

Sirius showed off his hands and arms. “Look, Remus, the amount of times he bit me, he never once tried to draw blood. He just wanted some buddies.”

It took a bit more convincing before he accepted that they all really were okay. They stayed with him for the remainder of his morning there. They hid in one of the smaller bedrooms when Madame Pomfrey came to collect him.

With the encouragement of a few hours of rest, a good, solid meal, and a handful of pain-relieving potions, Remus felt well enough that the Hospital Wing was driving him crazy. He begged Madame Pomfrey to allow him to attend afternoon classes, and eventually he wore her down. He promised her he’d see her again after dinner just to check on him before bed.

His friends were less prepared for the day. He met Sirius outside of his Arithmancy class and Sirius was ecstatic, but during class he kept very nearly falling asleep. James and Peter were the same, when they met up after class. Remus felt like floating. His body didn’t feel like death. For the first time in living memory, Remus felt like maybe he could stand being a werewolf sometimes.

Dutifully, he did go back to the Hospital Wing for his check-up before retiring to the Gryffindor Common Room with his friends.

“Oh,  _ now _ you’re sleepy,” Sirius teased as Remus yawned for the third time in a span of five minutes. 

“I’m always sleepy, I was just  _ also _ in a really good mood all day.”

“Mmm, good,” Sirius was lying across the couch with his head in Remus’s lap. Remus was, of course, in the best seat in the castle, soaking up the warmth of the fire and of Sirius. Peter was curled up in a round ball on an armchair across from them, and James was sprawled out in the floor between them. “Want to go lie down?”

Remus closed his eyes and sank further into the sofa. “Mhm, in five more minutes.”

He remembered nothing of the night after that, and when he woke up in need of a glass of water in the middle of the night, he found himself safe and sound in his bed.


	10. Chapter 10

Remus found himself spending less and less time not in physical contact with Sirius. What’s more is that rather than being overwhelmed by it, as he thought he might be, he found himself missing the connection on the rare occasion it was absent.   
  
They sat close enough that their legs were touching at breakfast and lunch. He spent the morning lessons taking notes and playing with Sirius’s hair idly while the professor lectured. In their breaks between class he kept Sirius in his lap, or nestled between his legs with Sirius’s head against his chest while they skimmed the required reading for the next class together. Even when he was deep in conversation with one of his other friends, Kingsley, or Lily, or a boy, Davey, he’d met earlier that day, Sirius was pressed closely to him as naturally as breathing, toying with his fingers or pulling at threads in his jumper.   
  
It was amazing, but it meant that when Remus got fed up with Professor Slughorn and collected his things and simply walked out of Potions that afternoon, he missed Sirius terribly.   
  
Remus regularly made a point of mostly using vacant bathrooms, even at his muggle school. He wasn’t keen to test the waters of transphobia at Hogwarts just yet. Or ever, really. He seized the opportunity to have a whole lavatory to himself while everyone else was in classes.   
  
It was going so well until he was ready to leave and was quickly halted by sudden and rapid footsteps. Presumably another male student came rushing into the restroom, hurriedly bustling about the sink. His breath was heavy and loud and filled with muffled sobs.   
  
When he didn’t seem like he’d be leaving anytime soon, Remus asked, “Hey, err, are you okay?”   
  
“Oh!” He immediately felt bad for startling the boy. He sounded like an older student, probably around Remus’s age. “I didn’t know there was anyone in here.” The boy’s voice was hard, thick against whatever emotion he was trying to suppress.   
  
“Just me. I’m safe. Are you all right?” he tried again.   
  
“I’m fine.”   
  
Remus sighed. There was no point in hiding any longer if the other student knew he was in there.   
  
He stepped out of the stall and gasped before he could stop himself. The boy was attempting to wash his forearm in the sink. The skin there looked, at first, horribly mangled. When he stepped closer he could see that it wasn’t random disfigurement, but fresh burns in a deliberate shape. A skull, and a line twisting and curling around it and through it that could only have been a snake.   
  
“Is that…”   
  
“I didn’t do it myself!” the boy yelled defensively and brought his arm to his chest with a wince Remus could feel in his soul. He had tidy, dark hair and light, youthful eyes. His features were so delicately placed Remus thought they might have been sculpted that way.   
  
“I never would have dreamed that you had. Who did that to you?” Remus found a clean towel and soaked it in the still-running water.   
  
“No one. Friends.” The student, a Slytherin, Remus could tell by his uniform, accepted the cloth and pressed it to his wound. Tears spilled over the corners of his eyes, but he bit back any noise they might have made.   
  
Remus shut the water off. “I think maybe you need new friends.”   
  
The boy gave a snort. “I’m fine. I don’t need your help.”   
  
Remus held his hands up and stepped away. “I didn’t mean to overstep. Just looked like you could use somebody. I won’t help if you don’t want, but I think maybe you should see someone for that? I think if it doesn’t heal it might get infected.”   
  
“Infected?”   
  
“Yeah, like, germs could get into it and it could get worse.”   
  
Remus watched the boy contemplate for a long moment. “I can’t go to the hospital wing like this.” His voice, this time, was quiet. Regretful.   
  
“Is there someone else you can trust?” Remus asked, but he thought he might know the answer before he did.   
  
The Slytherin looked down at his arm and slowly shook his head. “No. There’s no one.”   
  
“Okay, so… do you think you could trust me?” Remus asked.   
  
The boy eyed him warily. “I don’t even know you.”   
  
“I’m Remus. I’m here as a pen pal this week.” Remus made a move to shake hands but, given the state of the other boy, thought better of it and awkwardly swung his own hand back into himself.   
  
The boy’s eyes lit up in a startlingly familiar way. “Êtes vous Beauxbatons?”   
  
Remus blinked. “Erm. What?”   
  
“You’re not from Beauxbatons, then? You don’t look like you’re from anywhere else.” The boy didn’t seem to mean his words as rudely as they came out.   
  
“Well, no. I’m normally homeschooled, I’m here as the sole representative from a muggle school,” he explained.   
  
“They let you do that?”   
  
Remus was glad to keep the conversation flowing if it meant that the boy was no longer consumed by the pain in his arm. “Well, they probably wouldn’t have if I’d only asked myself, but my writing partner is very persuasive. Do you know Sirius Black?”   
  
They boy’s eyes – grey, Remus could see now, so light they almost looked silver – grew wide and round. “I need to go,” he said abruptly.   
  
Remus was taken aback. “What? What did I say?”   
  
The boy didn’t linger to provide an explanation. He turned and left even more quickly than he’d arrived, damp cloth still pressed to the Dark Mark magically burned into his forearm.   
  
A thought occurred to Remus as he walked back to class, playing the interaction over and over again in his mind all the while – particularly the boy’s fine, perfect features and the light that had come into his eyes just before he’d asked something in French, that this person had to be one of the Black family relatives Sirius had said attended Hogwarts as well.   
  
Remus waited for Sirius to get out of class, mind still reeling with the interaction, to ask about the boy, but it was cast out of his mind entirely by the inquiry Sirius made as soon as they were reunited: “Is tonight a good night to bombard the kitchens?”   
  
At sundown, James led the way down to the kitchens, beyond the portrait of the bowl of fruit. They made Remus do the pear-tickling, which he thought might have been one of the strangest experiences of his life.   
  
The kitchen was enormous. Nearly the size of the Great Hall, one floor above them. Oh , he considered, and looked up at the ceiling. Maybe it was exactly the size of the Great Hall. And maybe the Great Hall was very much one floor above them.   
  
Sirius caught Remus looking and saved him the question. “Yes it is. They put the food on those tables there, and elf magic brings it up at mealtimes.” Remus looked around at the tables Sirius was talking about. They looked long enough to be twins of the ones they ate meals at, but with no benches.   
  
And then Remus spotted the elves. Waist-high, ancient-looking beings, with enormous eyes and ears. They wore tunics that came straight down, like something not quite Grecian. When he got close enough, he could see that they were scrapped linens and pillow cases.   
  
“Remus, this is Nifty, Nifty, the boy I was telling you about, Remus. Nifty is the head of the kitchens.”   
  
“Good evening, Sirs,” Nifty’s voice was high and brittle, but strangely not unpleasant. “We have prepared a section for you to do your cookings, if you’ll follow me.” They followed Nifty past a hundred bustling house elves, busily preparing dinner for the entire castle above. “We thinks we prepared everything to your convenience, but if there is anything else you need, we are happy to oblige.”   
  
There was a wooden work station with a huge bowl full of potatoes and onions, a glass bottle of cooking oil, a sack labeled “flour”, a salt shaker, and a small basket of eggs. Right next to this was a stove that already had a frying pan on it, with two spatulas neatly placed down by its side.   
  
“This is perfect,” Remus commented, biting back the “eerily perfect” that was sitting on his tongue. “Is there a sink for washing?”   
  
Remus didn’t think he’d said anything wrong, but Peter and James winced and Nifty’s eyes widened in horror. “Sirs did not say you’d be wanting to do the washing.”   
  
“It’s okay, Nifty!” Sirius assured the elf. “We’ll just leave the washing here, yes?”   
  
Nifty looked relieved. “Yes, that will be good, thank you, Sir.”   
  
He walked off to tend to the main dinner the rest of them were preparing and Sirius broke into laughter. “You nearly gave that poor elf a heart attack. Trying to do the cleaning for him,” he shook his head. Remus still felt uneasy about the employment of house elf services. He told himself he’d at least clean up what he could with magic so that there was less of a mess for them.   
  
“Okay. So. There’s four of us. We’ll need two people to peel potatoes and one to do the frying. I’ll do all the in between stuff. Sound okay?” Remus was suddenly nervous. He’d been imagining this evening so much lately. What if the others didn’t have fun? What if they didn’t get why Remus loved it so much? What if they hated latkes?   
  
“Sounds perfect, I call frying!” Peter shouted and put his hand up like they were in class.   
  
“Joke’s on you, I wanted peeling anyway!” Sirius picked up one of the larger knives and brandished it at Peter. James picked up a more sensibly sized knife for potato peeling, and they got to work.   
  
The nerves that struck Remus right before they began immediately dissipated when the actual work was being done. James and Sirius made the potato peeling into a competition to see who could do it faster. They each had enormous piles of skinned potatoes in front of them within minutes. While they worked and verbally harassed each other, Remus diced onions. He only cut his finger twice. It was a personal record.   
  
“Are you okay?!” Sirius had asked. His concern cost him several valuable seconds of peeling time to James.   
  
“Oh yeah. It’s not real latkes unless there’s at least a hint of blood sweat and tears in them,” he informed them. They all seemed a little afraid of that, but he didn’t bother correcting himself. They’d learn, the sarcasm came with the latkes.   
  
Sirius was horrified when Remus began to just dump flour and salt into the mixture of shredded potatoes, diced onions, and eggs.   
  
“Aren’t you going to measure?” he’d squeaked.   
  
“Nah. I’ll know when it feels right.”   
  
“I can’t believe you’re not good at potions,” Peter snorted. Remus smiled. He was getting the sarcasm thing.   
  
When the first round of latkes was in the oil, frying, Remus leaned against the working station and started telling stories. He presented the story of Hanukkah the way his grandfather had told it to him when he was little. With much drama and flare. To their credit, his audience was wildly receptive. James and Sirius acted out pieces of the story with James as Judah.   
  
Remus was a much less effective storyteller than his grandfather had been. He kept interrupting himself to interject with stories of his family and memories of past Hanukkahs. He also was sure that there were parts of the story he skipped over, and parts he edited in that weren’t technically a part of the story but had been added along the way of the cultural history. He also told the little Hanukkah stories he’d grown up with that didn’t have anything to do with the origin story. Like Hershel and the Hanukkah Goblins . They fought hard with him to get him to sing some of the songs, but he stubbornly refused.   
  
“Another Hanukkah,” he promised.   
  
They laid the latkes out on a baking sheet covered with a towel, to remove some of the excess grease, placed a heating charm over them, and took them back to the dormitory with some other essentials. Namely apple sauce, sour cream, and chocolates provided by the house elves.   
  
Once they were securely in their dorm, while the others were setting up their little feast on a blanket on the floor, Remus dug around in his bag for the single dreidel he’d managed to bring with him. All of the others were in a tin somewhere in the chaotic closets and pantries of his home.   
  
It was one of the nicest Hanukkah’s Remus could remember ever having had. They ate latkes picnic style, with pretty much everyone grossed out by Remus’s insistence that latkes had to be consumed with both sour cream and applesauce in every bite, and played dreidel, which the others took to incredibly quickly. They played using the little chocolates they’d gotten from the house elves as the pool, and played well into the night. James had the best spin, it nearly flew every time, but the worst luck. Peter’s best tactic was to throw it down, hoping it turned over enough times that the others wouldn’t demand a re-spin.   
  
Sirius and Remus sat up in bed even past that. They huddled close under the covers, bodies intertwined, and began reading the werewolf book together. It wasn’t the greatest article of literature Remus had ever encountered, but it wasn’t half bad.   
  
“Is that what it really looks like?” Sirius asked. The second chapter gave a rather gruesome account of what happened to the body during a transformation.   
  
Remus shrugged. “I don’t know what it looks like. Feels accurate, though. The pulling and breaking and ripping.”   
  
Sirius said nothing, but he found Remus’s hand with his own and squeezed their fingers together.   
  
When they finally turned the lights off, somewhere in the early hours of the morning, Sirius put his arms around Remus’s neck and nestled his head into Remus’s shoulder, and that’s how he fell asleep.   
~   
Remus’s plan to sleep in Saturday was devastated by an exuberant James, wearing his quidditch gear and carrying his broom over to Remus’s bed at six o’clock in the morning.   
  
“Sleepy heads! Get up! It’s time our baby wolf-bird learns to fly!” He shouted, startling Remus awake. Sirius groaned and curled into Remus’s side against the noise and sudden light of Peter opening the drapes.   
  
“They grow up so fast,” Pete sighed dramatically.   
  
They grabbed breakfast from the Great Hall and walked with it down to the quidditch pitch. Remus was still half asleep. It was too cold, a fact which he whined about the entire way there. But when they came to the field itself, Remus couldn’t help but be impressed.   
  
The stands stood five stories high, sturdy and brightly coloured, covered in tapestry symbolizing the various houses. The gold hoops at either end of the field seemed so much more imposing and proud than Remus had ever imagined. It was all very real .   
  
James took him flying first, so he could get a feel for being in the air. Remus got onto the broom behind him and held his waist tightly.   
  
The air was not less cold by any measure. In fact it stung Remus’s face as they whizzed through it, circling the field. He could feel every pocket of air, every shifting current with his whole body. Remus laughed into James’s shoulder, taken with joy.   
  
Peter and Sirius were applauding when they landed. Remus stumbled off the broom, still giggling and euphoric, and Sirius caught him.   
  
“Ready to try on your own?” James asked, and held his broom out to Remus. “You can stay low to the ground your first time, and go at a pace that feels good to you. You’ll work up to going that high or that fast, give it time.”   
  
Remus loved the irony of being taught patience by the boy who’d woken him up at an ungodly hour to go flying. He accepted the broom, only a little queasy with anxiety.   
  
It was a rocky start, as he had known it would be. His legs wobbled as he straddled it, head filled with the worst possible scenarios of what could go wrong. He looked around at the others for reassurance. James and Peter were yelling nonsense, egging him on, and Sirius was beaming. He didn’t look like he was thinking of the millions of dangerous ways Remus could mess this up. Instead he looked like he had every confidence in his friend. Remus took that look as solidarity and turned around. And flew.   
  
The broom was even more wobbly than his legs had been, but after one truly awful moment, in which Remus was sure he was going to crash and be sick – and not necessarily in that order – he managed to level out, and lower himself to a point from which, if he did fall off, he probably wouldn’t break anything vital.   
  
He liked flying. The boys took turns giving Remus little teaching tips. James’s were the most helpful, and it was quickly and very casually decided that at some point over the summer, they would all get together and James would teach him.   
  
All through the morning, people had trickled onto the pitch. Some stayed on the ground – a few of whom also offered Remus flying advice – and some found more comfortable looking seats in the stands. It was a common occurrence, according to Peter and Sirius, for people who just enjoyed quidditch to see activity on the pitch from some castle window and gather their friends to go watch whichever team was practicing. But once the sun was fully up and the mist had cleared from the snowy grounds, it wasn’t so much a trickle as it was a flood. The Hogwarts students had attracted the attention of students of other schools and the stands were filling quickly.   
  
Thankfully, they weren’t all occupying themselves watching Remus’s semi-failed attempts at flight. A bunch of kids had taken school brooms and were showing of at the other end of the pitch.   
  
“I’ll be right back,” James said, a suspicious glint in his eyes, and ran down the field to talk to the other students.   
  
When he returned, he looked positively giddy. “Okay, so we’re organizing teams, Pete, help me find anyone who plays. We’re going to have a friendly, inter-school tournament!”   
  
Remus was impressed that they’d organized this in a matter of minutes. Sirius and Remus climbed into an already crowded stand to get seats.   
  
“Sirius! Remus! Over here!” Lily yelled. She was standing toward the front of the box with Alice and Mary. They wound their way over to the girls and squeezed into the small space. Remus wasn’t a fan of crowds as a general rule, but the positivity of this particular crowd was infectious. It was overwhelming, but also overwhelmingly nice.   
  
The tournament lasted all day. Many students, Remus, Sirius, and Lily included, skipped lunch to continue watching. Through the day, the impromptu school teams slowly unraveled. Players were traded and swapped out without concern for which school they were from, and soon, they adopted colours, rather than school names, as indicators of which team was which.   
  
While Sirius screamed his head off no matter which team was on the field, Remus and Lily talked, occasionally standing up to cheer along with everyone else.   
  
“He’s a really good teacher, you know,” Remus commented. James had just flown by showing off a miraculous set of mid-air tumbles. “Encouraging and gentle. He says he’ll teach me more over the summer.”   
  
Lily followed James with her eyes. “Yeah, he’s amazing alright. I just wish he wasn’t so pompous about it.”   
  
Remus frowned, thinking. “I don’t think it’s pompousness, I think he just really loves what he’s doing.”   
  
“You didn’t know him when absolutely everything that came out of his mouth was pompousness,” Lily reminded him. “It’s a hard memory to shake.”   
  
“I don’t doubt that. But coming from an objective perspective, it doesn’t read as arrogance at all.”   
  
Lily tapered out of the conversation and joined Sirius in keeping careful tags on James wherever he went. Remus watched Sirius in much the same way. He truly loved that about James, and about all of his friends. Whatever they were discussing, or doing, or thinking of doing, they put all of their hearts into it without shame.   
  
  
  
Remus didn’t get involved much in the after-party festivities, but he was nonetheless glad to be a part of them. He liked watching the students who already knew each other so well interacting and having fun, and he liked watching new relationships blossom with the foreign students. One effect that the quidditch mock-tournament had had was that everyone seemed to be speaking to everyone now. Before that morning, the Beauxbatons students mostly lingered near the Gryffindors, and the Uagadou students mostly stayed with the Hufflepuffs. The party in question took place in Gryffindor tower, but it hosted people from every year of every house in every school.   
  
“Do you think it’s better that you’re here when everything’s so strange? With the other students, I mean. Do you think of it like a good opportunity to experience all these wizarding cultures at once, or do you wish you’d come on a week when it was just business at usual so you could get a real feel for life at Hogwarts?” Sirius asked a few hours later, when he, Remus, James, and Peter had decided everything downstairs was a bit overwhelming and a quieter celebration in their dormitory would feel nicer.   
  
Remus stretched out on Sirius’s bed, an arm and a leg landing comfortably on Sirius himself. “I dunno, both, I think. I do love seeing all these people and getting to know things about other places, and I think if I’d missed that I would have felt even more cheated by Hogwarts for depriving me of opportunities like that. But yeah, I also really want to feel what the castle is like when it’s just Hogwarts.”   
  
Sirius nodded thoughtfully, but made no further attempt at that conversation. On the other side of the room, Peter was switching records in the turntable and James was scribbling topics for the “epic game of charades” he kept going on about.   
  
“Hey, do you think I could see the map?” Remus asked, remembering one of the many things he’d been looking forward to on this trip.   
  
“Oh! Yes! Of course!” Sirius jumped up, displacing Remus’s limbs, and threw himself at the floor in front of James’s trunk.   
  
Peter and James abandoned what they were doing to come over to Sirius’s bed and properly present the map to Remus. It was incredible. So much passion had gone into the parchment they laid on the bed before him. Remus couldn’t imagine finding all of the little nooks and crannies represented on the map in a hundred years, but they’d managed it in only six. Some rooms had little notes next to them, some specific portraits were labeled, some rooms were drawn in, but deliberately scribbled out. Remus had to assume there was some reason those ones were no longer accessible, or the boys would have simply taken them off of the map.   
  
“This is something you should be proud of for your whole lives,” Remus said quietly. There was something sacred about the moment and the map that made raising his voice seem uncouth.   
  
“Thank you,” Sirius smiled and hugged his arm.   
  
“But it doesn’t feel finished ,” James complained. “It doesn’t feel like it has enough us in it, yet. If this is our legacy, I want it to be clear that it’s our legacy. That anyone who picks it up knows it’s not just any map, it’s our map.”   
  
Remus folded the parchment over and opened it again, examining. “Well, what if you put a bit of you into it? Not like actually putting yourself into it. But a charm that mimics your personal flare and speaks to whomever does pick it up. And also warns them to stay the hell away because why are they picking up things that don’t belong to them?”   
  
The boys were quiet and Remus was sure he’d overstepped.   
  
“How would we accomplish that?” James asked slowly.   
  
Remus shrugged. “Dunno, but it’s possible. For my twelfth birthday Dad got me a diary that I could set a password for and if someone said the wrong password, it would imitate me and tell them to fuck off. Well, not in so many words, but that was the idea. So it’s definitely a thing, and if we figure it out we can do it six times better than a cheap child’s diary.” He tried to sound casual, like he was still mostly joking about the idea, but in his head he was already trying to think of what books in the school library might be helpful to them if they were to attempt it.   
  
“It’s genius. We need a measure of protection that’s not just keeping it locked in my trunk. It’s perfect,” Peter agreed.   
  
“What else?” Sirius asked. When Remus only looked confused, he prompted, “What else does the map need?”   
  
Remus looked down at the work of art on parchment. “How far are you willing to go with it?”   
  
“The ends of the earth,” James’s eyes were intense.   
  
“I mean, a bit,” Peter rolled his eyes at his absurd friend.   
  
They waited for Remus to elaborate. “Well… having a map of the school is fantastic. But what if we could find a way to plot movement within the castle? It would be the ultimate tool for getting around the place undetected.”   
  
James audibly gasped. “Is that something we could do?”   
  
Remus drew his fingers over the now-familiar halls on the map. “Is there anything you can’t do?”   
  
“Remus’s name goes on the map.” Sirius made no pretense of stating it like a question. “If we do the things he’s saying, and we’re absolutely doing the things he’s saying, then his name goes on, too.”   
  
“Yes, obviously, did that even need to be said? I thought that was a given,” James said. Peter nodded fervently. Remus’s heart felt like an inflating balloon.   
  
Even so, he argued, “that doesn’t seem fair. You all have worked six years on it, I’ve only just come in with suggested edits now.”   
  
“Edits? Remus, this is going to entirely transform the project,” Sirius laughed incredulously.   
  
“Remus’s name goes on it and Remus’s name goes on first.” James demanded.   
  
They were absurd. They were out of their senses. Remus loved every one of them.   
  
There was no deterring them from this. They bypassed the discussion of whether or not his name should even go on it quickly, to what name it should be.   
  
“We can’t call him Remus on there. Remus, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs? He needs a nickname.”   
  
“A pet-name.”   
  
“Respectably Juicy Lemon!”   
  
“Oh yeah, that really rolls of the tongue. Respectibly Juicy Lemon, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs. Excellent.”   
  
“Something to do with the wolf? I know it’s not an animagus, not even close, but it seems too perfect not to.”   
  
“Wolfy? Fur-boy? Fluffy.”   
  
“Howl. Moon-Yeller.”   
  
“Oooh, Moon something! Moonshine, or Moonbeam!”   
  
“What about Moony?” Remus had let them run away with the debate long enough. If he was going to have a wolf-related-nick-name, he was damn well going to pick it himself.   
  
“Moony. Moooooonyyyyyyy, yes, I could whine that at you when you steal all the covers in the middle of the night. I like it!” Sirius laughed and piled on top of Remus. “Remus Moony John Lupin. Welcome to the Marauders.”   
  


~

  
Compared with the bright atmosphere of the previous day, Sunday morning found a bleak and quiet castle. Everyone seemed acutely aware that it was the final day of the visitors’ stay at Hogwarts. When Sirius had asked, Remus admitted that he was anxious with the impending departure, but “probably not quite as much as the others – not yet, anyway.” McGonagall had informed him earlier in the week that he would be expected to stay one extra night, if he pleased. Which, Sirius was relieved, he did.   
  
Snow turned the sky a monotonous white-grey. It was impossible to tell where the edge of the horizon began and the snowy hills ended through it. Many students saw this as a reason to stay inside by the fires and get in their last few hours with their friends, but not Sirius, James, Peter, and Remus. Not The Marauders. They dressed in all their warmest clothes and lay claim to an untrodden piece of the grounds, enough space and snow for a quality snowball fight.   
  
Remus and Peter fought James and Sirius, for teams. It was intense beyond any they’d had at Hogwarts before. They gave themselves fifteen minutes of preparation, with a stipulation of no magic. During this time Sirius and James prepared as many canon-sized snowballs as they could and formed a massive pile of them, and Remus and Peter erected what could only be described as a fortress. It had started as a laughable lump in the ground, but within minutes, was the height half of Remus, and it looked as sturdy as any of the castle walls.   
  
James scoffed at it. “That’s all well and good, but how are they going to fight with no ammunition? They’re going to have to make snowballs as they go, we’ll have them covered before they can even think of taking refuge.” He seemed confident, but Sirius was less sure. Remus and Peter were talking quietly and they had suspiciously smug smiles plastered onto their faces.   
  
When the fight began, James ate his words and also about six mouthfuls of snow.   
  
While Sirius and James lobbed snowball after snowball in rapid succession, Remus and Peter hid behind their façade. James and Sirius normally had pinpoint accuracy, and they had the advantage of mobility, but without crossing the designated line into the other team’s territory there was only so far they could reach. Meanwhile the other two had devised an assembly system, in which Peter gathered snow and formed snowballs to pass to Remus, who in turn used his long, lanky, perfect, stupid arms to throw them. His accuracy was terrible, but all he needed was a few lucky throws.   
  
Ten minutes into the battle, two things happened in quick succession. Sirius and James ran out of pre-collected snow balls and had to pause their movements in order to make more, leaving themselves open and vulnerable, and Remus fired one timely, very fortunate snowball at Sirius. It hit him in the back of the head. It was soft and burst into powder as soon as it made contact, but it left Sirius with tousled, snow-streaked, damp hair. Everyone stopped. Sirius turned to James slowly, eyes wide and wild.   
  
“Fuck it?” Sirius asked.   
  
James nodded solemnly. “Fuck it.”   
  
Sirius kept turning, this time to face Remus. Remus stood up straight for the first time since the beginning of the fight, and leaned over the wall. “Sirius, are you okay? I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to hit you in the head, was it hard? I thought I was going to miss for sure, I didn’t even aim, I’m so sorry, Padfoot, say something, are you alright?”   
  
Sirius yelled and James yelled with him and together they charged. They threw themselves across the fictional barrier between the sides and into the wall of snow. Peter screamed as it came avalanching down.   
  
Sirius landed on Remus with about a foot and a half of packed snow between them. “Sirius, are you-” Remus had probably been about to ask if Sirius was okay, but he couldn’t get a word in. Sirius and James were laughing hysterically, rolling around victoriously in the decimated remains of the edifice.   
  
Peter piled snow on top of them in playful agitation while Remus just stared. He was still waiting to be chastised or blamed for something. Sirius smiled and shook his wet hair in Remus’s face, digging the bulk of the snow out from between them so that he could rest his cold nose on Remus’s warm cheek.   
  
“Good game, Moony,” Sirius giggled and grabbed a fist full of snow to rub into Remus’s hair.   
  
After lunch, James and Peter went back to the common room to warm up and Sirius and Remus found themselves back on the frosty grounds, taking a slow stroll around the lake. Sirius had too much boundless energy, and he spent it alternating between walking with Remus and changing into Padfoot and running in circles around Remus while he walked and laughed. And, most importantly, scratched behind Padfoot’s ears.   
  
“How do you still have all of this in you? I’m about ready for a nap,” Remus whined. Sirius switched back into human-shape but continued running and dancing around Remus.   
  
“It’s one of the great mysteries of the world, I am beyond such weaknesses as sleepiness.”   
  
“Oh, are you?” Remus snorted. He reached out and caught Sirius’s hand as it flew by. Sirius stopped running around him for the rest of their walk, preferring the pleasant stroll and holding hands.   
  
No meal so far had come close to the rich decadence of the welcoming feast, but, Sirius decided that evening, the farewell feast overshadowed it by a mile. He’d never seen a feast so absolutely packed with fine food in all his time at Hogwarts. The house elves must have been working on it for days leading up to it. He couldn’t believe how much there was.   
  
Remus’s eyes glazed over at its first appearance and he hardly talked all through dinner as his mouth was always too full to speak. He and Sirius sat by themselves, as James and Peter and everyone else were spending their last evenings with their writing partners. Sirius was delighted to find that even without their friends as conversational buffers, and with Remus exceptionally quiet for sake of food, they were perfectly comfortable being together and simply being together.   
  
They had the whole night to themselves like this. They went straight up to the dorm after dinner – a necessity for Remus, or he’d be sick – and laid down together in Sirius’s bed, talking into the night. They were fast asleep by the time Peter and James made it back to the dormitory, having said their goodbyes to their friends.   
  


~

  
“It’s the last day of class before the holiday, anyway. Loads of people skip,” Sirius sat on his bed, defiantly still in his pyjamas, pouting.   
  
“Loads of people, not us. I already missed a bunch of classes because of the stupid moon, I won’t get another opportunity, I want every minute of authentic Hogwarts learning that I can get.” Remus pulled on socks that were two completely different shades of red.   
  
Sirius didn’t budge. “But I want every minute of authentic Moony that I can get.” He swallowed hard against the lump in his throat, but it didn’t yield. When Remus continued getting dressed and ready for classes, Sirius gave in and followed, morose. He willed himself not to cry before they even had breakfast.   
  
Sirius couldn’t figure out why everyone was so loud. Hadn’t their friends all just gone home? Weren’t they still devastated by the loss? Couldn’t they feel how empty the castle was now? But the Hogwarts Express would be coming that evening to take everyone home to their families and the usual Christmas buzz filled the halls of the castle.   
  
James scooted up close to Sirius during Transfiguration. It was not a day of vital learning. McGonagall seemed to understand this, and had them completing ungraded quiz work to assess their knowledge. It was not difficult and the low hum of chatter went unscolded.   
  
“Pads, come home with me.” The Potters had issued the invitation weeks ago, but Sirius had steadfastly declined. He’d built up the idea of staying at Hogwarts over winter break too much, he wanted to experience it, now.   
  
“No, thank you,” Sirius mumbled.   
  
“You’re just going to stay here and sulk, then?” James asked quietly.   
  
Sirius tucked his hair behind his ear. “I’m not going to sulk, but I am going to be here, yeah.”   
  
“You’re going to see him again. Soon. Just a few months,” James assured him.   
  
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Sirius let the hair fall back in front of his face to hide the betraying wateriness of his eyes. James backed off after that and Sirius was free to watch the back of Remus’s head. He scribbled notes and answers in that once-illegible chicken-scratch of his. Sirius could read it perfectly without even trying, now.   
  
They both did cry at the tiny Hogwarts train station. Sirius was admittedly a bit relieved. Remus had been so nonchalant about it all day, he was sure he didn’t even care.   
  
“I’m going to miss you so much,” he said, eyes shining, long fingers locked tightly with Sirius’s. They were standing very close on the platform – the only pair saying such heavy farewells. Everyone else would be seeing their friends in a matter of weeks. Sirius couldn’t imagine what the coming Remus-less months were going to be like.   
  
“I love you,” Sirius managed through quiet tears.   
  
“I love you, too.” Remus removed his hands from Sirius’s and brought them to Sirius’s face. He held him there for a very, very long moment – standing so close, with his thumbs flicking away tears on Sirius’s cheeks.   
  
James and Peter led Remus onto the train and the three of them waved from their compartment window at him. Sirius hadn’t felt that alone in a long time.


	11. Chapter 11

**Real Joy of Life,**

**I was waiting for you to write first, but you did technically write the last letter, so I’ll try to put aside my worries that it’s because you didn’t have any interest in writing me yet. We won’t ever stop, right? The writing? I want us to write these letters until we’re old and dying and then keep writing them until we’re dead.**  
**I hate it here without you.  
** **I can’t think of anything to say, so I keep leaving the letter on my desk and coming back to it, but nothing is coming to me and it’s been all day. Nothing good, anyway. Lots of sad things, negative things, and you’re off celebrating the holidays with your family, so I won’t drag you into my misery. But I do miss you. A lot.**

 **Love,  
** **Sad Over Break**

**P.S. No, but like, a lot a lot.**

 

 

_Sour Or Bitter,_

Hi. Your letter came home before me. It was a long train ride, and James and Pete kept me busy telling stories about you lot and all your train rides I missed. I talked to Lily a bit as well, and Mar, or as she’s letting me call her, Marls. But I still found the time to miss you, so it was really nice to see your letter on my windowsill.  
Yes, we won’t ever stop. I love writing to you, I love getting your letters, I love being your friend, and you being mine. You’re not getting rid of me just because I had to go back home.  
_My folks are really happy to have me back, there was lots of hugging. They’re lame and they missed me a lot. Dad was asking me about all my feelings and thoughts about Hogwarts the whole car ride home from the station (they came to London to do some Christmas shopping, and mum hates apparating with him, so they came with the car (dad is usually not a fan of that and fights her on it, but I think he really wanted to experience picking me up at King’s Cross))._  
 _Tomorrow I’m gonna go to town and do some shopping myself, and then dad and I are gonna put up the tree, and the lights outside, and then we’re gonna have Christmas Eve dinner. I’m not looking forward to the pudding, none of us has any idea how to make it properly, I envy you yours at Hogwarts. I hope you won’t feel too lonely. I’m thinking about you._

_Love,  
Roommate Just Left _

_P.S. Go to sleep early tonight, tomorrow is Christmas!_

 

        

 

Sirius woke up alone on Christmas morning. It felt _off_. He couldn’t remember how to do it properly without at least James and Peter around. It made him acutely aware of his actions – did he always turn onto his side before he sat up? Did he usually get his socks from the sock drawer first, or his shirt from the wardrobe? His sense of routine was gone in their absence. It didn’t help any that his pillow still smelled like Remus.

What did help was the small, but respectable pile of presents at the end of his bed. Bird must have delivered them while he slept, like Father Christmas. There were packages and letters from all his friends, and the pile he’d been keeping of ones to send to them in return was gone. He sat beside the new pile and picked up the largest one, from Lily.

It was a Hogwarts uniform. A used one. It had probably fit Lily several years ago, but it would likely fit Sirius presently. He tucked it into his trunk for when he was feeling brave. He was still hesitant after the trauma he’d sustained wearing Mary’s uniform.

He got through half the pile before the smallest card slipped out onto the floor. It wasn’t even in an envelope, it was just sitting there. He picked it up and flipped it open.

 

_Santa Old Bloke,_

_Waaaaaake uuuuuup, it’s Christmas!!!!!!!!!!! Your gift from me is waiting for you in the common room._

_Yours,  
Reindeer Jumping with Love _

_P.S. Hurry up!_

 

Sirius tried to be excited about whatever it was. It had to be something large, if not special if it wasn’t able to be carried right to the dorm with all the other gifts and cards, but he couldn’t help the heaviness in his stomach as he thought about opening any present from Remus alone.

He pulled on a bathrobe because he didn’t trust the fires in the common room to be lit with everyone else gone for the holiday, and climbed sullenly down the spiraling stairs.

There was no enormous package in shimmering paper, as some part of Sirius had begun expecting. There was no package at all. There was nothing at all. And then something moved and Sirius screamed.

Standing up out of an armchair by the unlit fire was Remus. Remus wearing the ugliest Christmas jumper Sirius could imagine, with a bright red ribbon tied around his middle, tied into a bow. Sirius flew down the rest of the stairs and flung himself into Remus’s arms, effectively squishing the bow.

“What?!” he yelled, not daring to let go. “What are you doing here? What’s going on?”

“Merry Christmas,” Remus laughed into Sirius’s hair. “I’m staying with you until term starts up again, that’s what’s going on.”

“WHAT!” Sirius shrieked again, and though he wanted to look Remus in the eye and make sure he was telling the truth – that this wasn’t some heartbreaking attempt at humor – his body just hugged Remus tighter instead.

Sirius was still in disbelief when he led Remus back to the dorm to finish unwrapping presents. Still, when they went down to breakfast with the handful of students and staff who remained at the castle over break. Still, while they spent the better part of the day curled up by the fire in the Gryffindor Common Room, reading, and joking, and talking, and playing games. It started to sink in about half way through the Christmas feast, when Remus was on his third helping of roast and a creeping warmth like mulled wine was spreading through Sirius as he watched.

With nobody around to tell them off for staying up so late, they fell asleep in front of the fire, Sirius’s body laid out over the length of Remus’s.

~

They spent the next several days enjoying the relative emptiness of the castle. Meals in the Great Hall all took place at a single, long table at the head of the room, and it gave Sirius a chance to talk to classmates he’d never personally met before, as well as several he never had an excuse to hang out with much.

He had exactly zero classes with Dorcas Meadowes, and never even really bumped into her in the hallways that much, but she always filled Sirius with warmth and affection. She’d stayed at Hogwarts over the break while her family was out of the country. She and Remus got on well immediately, and she made a habit of sitting with them at breakfast and dinner.

It was three days into Remus’s stay in the castle – three days of brief walks in the snow and long afternoons by the fire, playing games and talking – when he finally voiced a question he’d obviously been waiting to ask.

“So do you think it would reject me?” It was noon, but they were skipping lunch in the Great Hall that day in favour of a picnic of sweets in the common room. Sirius had been doodling in the back of his potions book while Remus walked around, inspecting portraits and the detail of the carved wood of the fireplace. When Sirius looked up Remus was standing by the wrong staircase, the one that led to the girls’ dormitories.

“Yeah? It doesn’t let boys up there,” Sirius said, confused.

Remus gave him a dry look, “Yes, but… do you think it knows?”

Sirius stood up and joined Remus, whose hand was on the banister, looking at it like it might suddenly become physically violent under his fingers. “Of course it knows. It knows enough to let me go, see?” He danced up the first dozen stairs and struck a pose.

Remus laughed nervously.

“You don’t have to try it, you don’t have any single thing to prove to anyone, let alone some thousand year old castle staircase,” Sirius let his hands fall to his sides.

Remus stood for a long moment, lost in unshared thoughts, and climbed onto the first step. When nothing happened, he looked crushed. He made it to the third step when, very suddenly, the entire staircase gave way beneath them and they both slid down what was now a slippery slide made of eroded stone. Sirius screamed and laughed when his body tumbled into Remus’s and they fell to the floor in a heap together. Remus laughed, too, tears of relief and some indescribable emotions leaking out of his eyes. Sirius wiped them and held Remus’s face in his hands.

“Remus. Which part of ‘it doesn’t let boys up there’ didn’t you hear?” he asked playfully. Remus laughed and tackled Sirius onto his back.

Once their mock fight had died down and the two lay on the stone floor, catching their breath, Sirius mused aloud, “But it does let me up.”

Remus scooted in close to him. “It does.”

“Because I’m not a boy.” Saying it out loud felt odd and surreal, but not quite incorrect.

“Okay. Do you know if you’re something else?” Remus put a hand on Sirius’s hip – the one he wasn’t resting on. It was warm and comforting and slowed his breath, which Sirius hadn’t realized had been getting too quick and shallow.

“I don’t think so. Just that whatever I am I’m not a boy and I’m not a girl, and I’m definitely not neither. Do you think there’s a name for that? Do you think I’m the first one?”

Remus smiled. “I think there’s lots of names for it and you can pick whichever one fits you best, and I _know_ you’re not the first one.”

Sirius sighed dramatically. “Thanks for dashing my dreams, Lupin, and here I thought I was special – unique, even! And you go and rain all over it, telling me I’m not the first.” But he was thankful, despite his words.

In the evenings, the pair went _marauding_. Sirius called it this – Remus called Sirius absurd. In any case, each night, they would wait until the few other Gryffindors had gone up to bed, and then waited even longer to be sure that the whole castle probably slept, and then they took out The Map. Each night, Remus would point to a place on the map he was curious about, and Sirius would take him there so they could explore.

Without even trying, they managed to find at least one new thing each night. Not new whole places, Sirius was sure if there were any of those left to find they wouldn’t be found so easily, but Remus had a gift for finding magical signatures. They discovered a wall on the fourth floor that sang when touched with the tip of a wand – soft and ethereal, and when it stopped singing, neither of them could remember it getting quite so late. There was a bathroom that Sirius had used a thousand times, never sensing anything off about it, but when he and Remus tried a few spells, the water in the fountain-sink began to shimmer and glow.

These findings were becoming commonplace, and Sirius began feeling like he had just as much to learn about the castle as Remus did, even after countless hours of prior discovery. More than anything, Sirius felt that everything around him was just more magical with Remus around. Remus brought the best of Hogwarts out of the stone and mortar castle, and he brought the best of Sirius out of him.

“I don’t want to leave here,” Remus admitted on the night before the other students were to return to the school, and the comfortable freedom of the castle they’d been enjoying would effectively come to an end. It was late – or rather very early. Their adventure that evening had involved a midnight walk by the frost-covered lake. The air had been icy but still, which was much more bearable than the biting wind to which they were becoming accustomed.

Sirius was lying on his side, Remus’s body spooned around him, warm, now, under the two sets of blankets Remus required to sleep well. “I don’t want you to either. I know I’ll see you soon, but anything more than a few hours isn’t soon enough.”

They were quiet for a long time, before Remus spoke again. “I’ve been thinking of something and I want your opinion on it.”

Sirius turned over, careful to stay under Remus’s arm, tucked tight against Remus’s body. “Go on.”

He almost said whatever it was, but at the last moment, he changed his mind. “Nah, it’s still too unrealistic. I will ask, but I’ll ask when it makes more sense to.”

Sirius nodded sleepily, curious, but not curious enough to put Remus’s comfort in jeopardy. “When you’re ready.”

“When I’m ready,” Remus repeated. Sirius was asleep before he heard anything else.

~

The New Year’s party was incredible. There were several options for parties and Sirius decided they shouldn’t pick one, so they picked a handful instead. He, Remus, James, and Peter spent a few hours before midnight in the Great Hall with everyone, eating and talking and vaguely swaying to music. Then they went up to the Gryffindor Tower party – an event not exclusively accessible to Gryffindors. Each of the houses was having some sort of gathering, but it seemed like Gryffindor’s was really the place to be. Anyway, Sirius wouldn’t go to a party hosted in another common room, no exceptions.

Finally, just before midnight, they made their way to the dorm, Lily along with them, and had their own, quiet, perfect celebration. James kissed everyone at the stroke of midnight. Peter and Sirius first, then little cheek kisses for Remus and, with her express, verbal permission, Lily. Sirius and Lily made as much noise as was humanly possible, and Remus and Peter sat back laughing.

It was, in all, the perfect end to a perfect stay at Hogwarts.

~

The station on the morning of the first was abysmal. It was really goodbye that time, and both of them knew it. Sirius was teary and mopey all morning and Remus was very quiet. The Hogwarts train station was cold and empty and, in Sirius’s opinion, completely devoid of magic.

James and Peter said their goodbyes and went to wait for Sirius by the gate while he and Remus stood and held each other for the longest time. Sirius thought if he could just delay Remus enough, maybe the train would leave without him and he’d be forced to stay just one more night. Just one more.

But it didn’t. It waited patiently for Remus to soak up enough Sirius to last him the ride back to London, and then there was nothing else to do.

“G-“

“I’ll see you soon.”

Sirius smiled, a watery, melted smile. “I’ll see you soon.”

Remus wiped a tear from Sirius’s eye as Sirius had done for him only days ago. It felt like three lifetimes and not enough time since that day all at once. His hand lingered on Sirius’s cheek and his face was so close that Sirius could no longer feel the sting of the wind. He could only feel Remus’s warmth and Remus’s breath, and the tumultuous beating of his own heart.

“Soon. I promise.” Remus pulled away from Sirius slowly, but it still left Sirius dazed and empty.

He waited on the platform until long after the train had left the station and the chill of the air had successfully seeped into his boots.   


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's November again, it's NaNoWriMo again, so another 50k of this is getting written (hopefully, no promises). I mean, if you'd be cool with that?


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